Lots of cases get parked in MDLs. There is no denying it. It’s built into the system. Individual cases get brought together in a single court for the purpose of consolidated pretrial proceedings. For the most part, except for cases selected as bellwethers, that means MDLs are focused on general discovery, general experts, and general
The Northern District of California did not mince words in its opinion in Rodman v. Otsuka America Pharmaceutical, Inc., 2020 WL 2525032 (N.D. Cal. May 18, 2020) and so neither will we. Plaintiff had three theories of failure to warn and a design defect claim and they all failed in grand fashion due in
A couple of weeks ago we compared New Jersey litigation with New Jersey food and decided we liked the food better. No aspersions were intended. After all, we grew up in New Jersey and still worship at the altars of Seton Hall Prep, Bruce Springsteen, and the New York football Giants. Anyway, we might need
A product is not defective simply because someone was harmed by it. That seems a simple enough point. Courts often acknowledge it, though sometimes in a perfunctory, mumbling fashion. What gives teeth to the mumbling is when state law requires the plaintiff to show a safer alternative product. If really pressed, many plaintiffs cannot articulate
Back in May, 3M won the first MDL bellwether trial in In re: Bair Hugger Forced Air Warning Devices Prods. Liab. Litig. (D. Minn.). The case was Gareis v. 3M Company and at the time of trial, the only claim remaining in the case was for strict liability design defect under South Carolina law. 2018
Today’s case has a little bit of everything – choice of law, statutory compliance, alternative design, warnings causation. So, the decision is a bit of “grab bag” in addition to being a “mixed bag.”
The case is Hyde v. C.R. Bard, Inc., 2018 WL 3586404 (D. Ariz. Jul. 26, 2018). To begin with, plaintiff
This post is from the non-Reed Smith side of the blog.
Today is a follow-up post on Bell v. Boehringer Ingelheim Pharms, No. 17-1153, 2018 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 90337 (W.D. PA. May 31, 2018). When we last blogged about this case back in February, the court had tossed out everything except negligence and fraud/misrepresentation
This post is from the non-Reed Smith side of the blog.
It may be post Mardi Gras season, but we don’t think there is ever a bad time to embrace the motto – “Laissez les bons temps rouler.” Quite literally – “Let the good times roll.” However, don’t try this with your high school French
Finally, some good news out of California – at least when personal jurisdiction isn’t the issue.
Design and warning defects were the questions presented in Trejo v. Johnson & Johnson, ___ Cal. Rptr.3d ___, 2017 WL 2825803 (Cal. App. June 30, 2017), and the result, particularly on the design side, was much more to
This post comes from the Cozen O’Connor side of the blog.
Plaintiffs and defendants have now completed briefing before the Fifth Circuit on defendants’ appeal of the $498 million verdict in the second bellwether trial of the Pinnacle hip implant MDL. Obviously, there is a lot riding on this appeal. In March, we laid out