Alabama

Subscribe to Alabama
Photo of Michelle Yeary

Way back in 2007 we said this:  “We really don’t see the purpose in a separate cause of action for breach of implied warranty in a case involving a prescription medical product. Warranty claims are for ham sandwiches and lawn chairs, where the term “merchantable” has some coherent meaning. . . . Except in unusual situations, where there’s physical contamination or a counterfeit product, an implied warranty of merchantability makes no sense and adds nothing except a different statute of limitations.”  We still feel the same way.  Fortunately, so do a lot of courts.

In some states breach of implied warranty claims have been merged with other warning-based theories of liability (like in New Jersey where all products claims other than breach of express warranty have been subsumed under the Products Liability Act).  In states where a breach of implied warranty claim remains as an independent cause of action, some courts have ruled that such claims are not allowed in the context of prescription drugs and devices.  The reasons vary but most often include application of the learned intermediary doctrine (see post here) or the unavoidably unsafe product doctrine.

And while at a quick glance, Alabama appears to be one of the states that generally doesn’t recognize a cause of action for breach of implied warranty of merchantability for inherently dangerous products – the law on the issue has become muddled over time.  So, in Collins v. Novartis Pharma. Corp., slip op., No. 2:08-cv-438-MHT-PWG (M.D. Ala. Jan. 14, 2015), the court tried to sort it all out.Continue Reading Risks Don’t Make Drugs Un-Merchantable in Alabama

Photo of Bexis

The Alabama Supreme Court redecided Weeks v. Wyeth, Inc., No. 1101397, slip op. (Ala. Aug. 15, 2014), today.  It’s not all that much different than the original “Weeks Reasoning” decision that we excoriated here.  In fact, the first 54 pages of Weeks II (out of a “pithy” 145 pages, one observer noted) are almost verbatim identical to Weeks I.  So we simply reiterate here everything we said in our original post about what we’ll now call “Weeks I.”  Weeks II made only the following changes to Weeks I:

  • Changing “Wyeth Defendants” to “Wyeth” (causing a lot of spacing differences).
  • Adding footnote 2, trying to deny the magnitude of what the court has done – claiming not to “plow new ground.”  Positively Freudian, that.  This footnote would sound less defensive if it could cite some prior Alabama case doing even remotely the same thing.  It doesn’t, because no such opinion exists.
  • Spending a couple of pages distinguishing Pfizer, Inc. v. Farsian, 682 So. 2d 405 (Ala. 1996), a case in which it had equated fraud and product liability claims, essentially because, Farsian involved cognizable injury and Weeks involves, not a “defect,” but “what [defendant] said or did not say about [the drug].”  Weeks II, at 12.  Funny, that’s one spot on way of describing what’s otherwise known as a “warning defect.”
  • New footnote 6 admitting – contrary to new footnote 2 – that “this is the first time the highest court of a state has addressed the issue.”  Except they then admit that’s not so either, because of Huck v. Wyeth, Inc., ___ N.W.2d ___, 2014 WL 3377071 (Iowa July 11, 2014).  In an exhibition of sheer profundity, Weeks II distinguishes Huck because “Iowa law differs from Alabama law” in precisely the way they are changing Alabama law to become.
  • A non-substantive new paragraph break (the opinion could use a lot more) on page 46.

Continue Reading Breaking News: Weeks II – Lipstick (and Not All That Much) on a Pig

Photo of Eric Alexander

We do not hide the fact that we like the TwIqbal twins, Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544 (2007), and Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662 (2009). Dismissals, even with leave to amend, are nice, but there is something more fundamental about requiring that pleadings provide meaningful information to the opposing party and the court about what the case is about.  As product liability defense lawyers, we tend to focus on how the difference between an uninformative boilerplate complaint and a complaint that spells out the pertinent facts and claims matters to the defendant.

We and our clients find it easier to do things like answer, move to dismiss, and map out a strategy for the case when the complaint includes information like the product at issue, when it was used, what injury it allegedly caused, where and when that injury happened, and what acts or omissions allegedly create liability.  If the complaint labels the causes of action being asserted, says what jurisdiction’s law is supposed to be implicated,and/or matches up the acts and omissions to the particular causes of actions, well, then that is just a bonus in our experience.

Not only do we use complaints to categorize cases by products, injuries, time of use in relation to events like label changes, lag from injury to filing, etc., but we have somewhere in our mind that at some point in the future we will be filing something with the court that includes a sentence like “plaintiff asserts causes of action for a, b, and c”and asks for something.  It is helpful at that point, whether it be on a motion to dismiss not based on TwIqbal, a summary judgment motion, proposed jury instructions, or something else, to not have to argue about the plaintiff has asserted something different than the a, b, and c we listed.  It is certainly helpful throughout the course of discovery, motions practice, and pretrial proceedings to have in mind the right a, b, and c so you are not wasting your efforts on α, β, and γ if א, ב, and ג are being asserted.
Continue Reading Inherent TwIqbal Authority

Photo of Bexis

This post is by the Reed Smith part of the blog only.  The Decherts are too involved in this litigation to comment publicly.

There aren’t many research-oriented pharmaceutical companies based in Alabama, and after last week’s execrable decision in Wyeth, Inc. v. Weeks, ___ So.3d___, 2013 WL 135753, slip op. (Ala. Jan. 11, 2013), that’s not likely to change any time soon.  We don’t know why that started; Huntsville, at least, has a distinguished scientific background (and there’s a statue of a Vulcan in Birmingham – wait a minute, the ears don’t match Spock’s), but it’s certainly true now.  Unfortunately it appears that, instead of (or perhaps in addition to, given the recent election results) the Ten Commandments, there’s another commandment that the Alabama Supreme Court is following:  Thou Shalt (if you’re an Alabamian) Recover From An Out-Of-State Drug Company.

While the Alabama Supreme Court certainly has the power to abandon the notion of manufacturer liability for defects in its products (unlike a federal court sitting in diversity), having the power to do something doesn’t make it right.  And if there’s one thing that’s not right, it’s having the liability of a defendant non-manufacturer turn on what its competitors did (or didn’t do).  And if there’s another thing that’s not right, it’s imposing liability on a product manufacturer that didn’t make a cent (and probably was driven out of the market by) from the product that actually caused the injury in question.

Nor is it very likely that this novel theory of “fraud/misrepresentation” liability can be limited to prescription drugs, whatever its intended scope.  There are lots of situations in which products bear similar warnings.

Sometimes, as with prescription drugs, such similarity is mandated by the government (cars, for example, or chemicals); sometimes similarity is simply a function of similar products having similar risks, and thus requiring similar warnings.  One such example could be asbestos.  There were lots of different asbestos products, and the same kinds of asbestos products do (or, at least, plaintiffs allege they do) have similar risks.  We have to think that asbestos plaintiffs are going to have a field day with Weeks – more, perhaps, than even generic plaintiffs, since the learned intermediary rule still applies to prescription drug cases.

Anyway, we could go through each of these policy considerations at length, but we’re not going to.  We already did that in connection with the original decision in Conte v. Wyeth, 168 Cal. App. 4th 89 (Cal. Ct. App. 2008).  So we’ll rely on our discussions there:

First, this kind of liability is contrary to the fundamental legal tenet that manufacturers’ are supposed to be liable because they made money putting the injurious product on the market:

Well, [branded liability] is an end run around the heart of modern product liability, which was created . . . some fifty years ago.  [Courts] recognized a core principle of social responsibility that justified what was then a new form of liability:  The purpose of this [product] liability is to ensure that the costs of injuries resulting from defective products are borne by the manufacturers that put such products on the market.  In other words, because manufacturers profit from the sale of their products, it is appropriate for them to answer for injuries caused by defects in those products.  Time after time, . . . liability for injuries caused by allegedly defective products has been justified by reference to this paramount policy.

DDLaw, Closing The Arguments On Conte (1/22/2009) (citations and quotation marks omitted).Continue Reading Weeks Reasoning – No Sweet Home In Alabama For Research Pharma

Photo of Bexis

We just did.  Not only did we suffer through Stengel yesterday, but today we received Weeks – that is Wyeth, Inc. v. Weeks, No. 1101397, slip op. (Ala. Jan. 11, 2013).  Alabama just recognized branded liability in a generic case – for fraud not AMELD, and assuming detrimental reliance by the physician.  The key…

Photo of Michelle Yeary

It has been almost three years since we reported that the Alabama Supreme Court overturned jury verdicts against three pharmaceutical companies in cases brought by the Alabama Attorney General alleging the defendants fraudulently manipulated the prices the state paid for drugs under Medicaid.  See AstraZeneca LP v. State of Alabama, 41 So.3d 15 (Ala.…

Photo of Bexis

Because of Dechert’s involvement in Reglan litigation, we can’t say as much as we’d like to (or used to) about so-called “Conte” liability – that is theories by which plaintiffs who only took generic drugs attempt to impose liability on the manufacturer of a branded bioequivalent that they neither bought nor consumed.  As…

Photo of Bexis

Back in April, we put up a post complaining about Weeks v. Wyeth, 2011 WL 1216501 (M.D. Ala. March 31, 2011), one of the few courts anywhere not to dismiss a Conte-type non-manufacturer liability claim for failure to state a claim.  Instead, contrary to five prior Alabama decisions (and literally scores of cases…

Photo of Stephen McConnell

Last week we settled a case. It was a good settlement. But we groused about it a bit, because we thought the judge should have granted us summary judgment on preemption grounds. The denial of summary judgment was truly “summary.” There was no written opinion at all, and the judge’s few statements at the hearing…

Drug & Device Resources

Bexis’ Book

FDA-regulated products now account for an estimated one-fifth of overall economic activity in the U.S. They have also been the focus of a litigation explosion. This timely guide covers all aspects of litigation involving drugs, medical devices, vaccines and other FDA-regulated prescription products.
Learn More About This Book