When times are tough, attempted humor can fall flat. Opinions often add little. Fancy prose and witty turns of phrase count for little. Facts, for those whose preconceived notions allow them to be received as such, matter. The language of statutes—potentially powerful drivers of needed stability or change—should be easy to understand even without reference
Utah Decision On SOL in Med Mal Cases Touches On Recurring Issues
Typically, medical malpractice cases are one-offs. A plaintiff may sue her doctor and/or hospital for failing to diagnose a condition or treating it in a suboptimal way. They tend to be highly fact-dependent even if the general subject, like post-operative infection, comes up fairly often within the world of med mal cases. In individual cases,
FNC Won’t Let Mass Litigation Tourism Be
There was once a musician from Michigan who rapped that “the FCC won’t let me be.” This was in the context of claiming that his songs were only permitted to be played over this thing called radio with edits that he apparently found unacceptable. In Cyr v. Ford Motor Co., No. 345751, 2019 WL
The Manufacturing Defect Claim Conundrum
If you have read more than a few posts on this Blog, then there is a good chance that you realize we have strong views on preemption. You might have also picked up that we think the way an issue is analyzed, not just the ruling after the analysis, matters. We have talked about the
Statute That Overturned Weeks Actually Overturned Weeks
For a few years, it seemed like we were blogging about the Weeks case every few months. Beyond providing an opportunity for temporal quippery, Weeks caught our attention because it was one of the holdout cases against the tide of cases rejecting Conte, the crappy California case that invented innovator liability. After the
Picky MDL Plaintiff Gets The Same Discovery Plate As Everyone Else
Picture this. Invitations go out for a Thanksgiving get-together and the host and expected guests together sort out who will bring what foods and how everything will be served. A sideboard is loaded up with the traditional holiday foods, along with a collection of everyone’s quirky favorite salad items to allow easy compilation of a
Direct-Filed MDL Case On Thin Ice For Personal Jurisdiction
We are writing about a case that does not involve drugs or devices because it runs through some of the very same personal jurisdiction issues we have warned about post-Bauman. Adams v. NHL, MDL No, 14-2551, Case No. 15-cv-00472 (SRN/JSM), 2019 WL 5079980 (D. Minn. Oct. 10, 2019), is a case from the
Federal Oversight For Plaintiff Lawyer Advertising
We write mostly about decisions in cases, with those mostly coming from judges. Occasionally, we will also comment on articles, amicus briefs, and official government pronouncements. We cannot remember the last time we explored a press release. In today’s political environment, speculation about what is contained in documents that purportedly exist but we cannot see
Mixed Treatment Of Clinical Trial Liability On Summary Judgment
A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. A jack of all trades is a master of none. These cutesy little phrases throw some derision toward one who possesses some knowledge in a bunch of areas. Representing drug and device companies in litigation can make a lawyer reject the negative interpretation of these phrases. We have
Med Mal Case Dives Deep Into Device Regulation
Reading through Obermeier v. Northwestern Memorial Hosp., __ N.E.3d __, 2019 IL App. (1st) 170553 (Ill. App. Div. June 28, 2019), reminded us of scrolling through television channels in the middle of the day with time to kill. The opinion started off talking about the basic medical facts of the case and we were