One of the more peculiar things about Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp. v. Albrecht, 139 S. Ct. 1668 (U.S. 2019) (“Albrecht”), is the almost off-hand way that the majority (made up mostly of justices that have opposed preemption in closer cases) wandered away from the procedural preemption issues that the Court was
On our office bulletin board, we keep a post-it listing the states we have not yet visited. We are down to ten, and we expected to cross Oregon off after a deposition last week. But our deponent moved from Bend, Oregon to St. George, Utah. We’ve been to Utah lots of times, and were annoyed
Indulge us for a moment as we recount another airline adventure. Recently, we traveled thousands of miles to an important argument. Our first flight boarded right on time, left the gate right on time, and taxied down the runway . . . partway. Then stopped. Enter the inevitable announcement: “Ladies and gentlemen, we’re very sorry,
First of all, in response to some comments on our last post, we wanted to close the loop on our dog show narrative. We liked the Wirehaired Fox Terrier, though we have no explanation for the inordinate number of times this breed has won Best in Show (twenty-two, we think we heard). Truth be told,
Private plaintiffs love to scream “fraud on the FDA”! Agency fraud is their magic potion for dissolving any FDA action that they don’t like. Just assert that the FDA was bamboozled and invite some jury somewhere to ignore what the FDA actually did. Unfortunately for the other side, Buckman Co. v. Plaintiffs Legal Committee,
A year and a half ago we celebrated a rare prescription drug preemption win in the Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas. Then the decision was appealed, and we held our breath. Preemption is never an easy sell in state courts, and Pennsylvania appellate courts are not exactly defendant friendly in prescription medical product liability
Next week, under pressure from the Drug and Device Law Lifelong Best Friend, we are participating in a “murder mystery dinner theatre” in the “conservatory” of a local cemetery. (We didn’t know cemeteries had “conservatories.”) It is a Halloween-themed event, with costumes encouraged, and we may or may not wear our eerily-lifelike Standard Poodle mask/hood.
At times, we have given a glimpse into the sausage making that goes into our production of posts on recent interesting cases and developments. Part of the process involves standing searches for “published” (including by the electronic services) decisions from trial courts and appellate courts. Sometimes, the trial court decisions are unpublished but interesting, and
Last week appears to have been a bit of a slow week in the drug and device litigation arena. It was after all a short work week. It was back to school week (at least in the North East), which while bringing delight to parents everywhere also brings the chaos of last minute school supply
We talk a lot on this blog about Buckman preemption. That isn’t just out of pride regarding Bexis’s role in the bone screw litigation that led up to the Buckman decision. The principle in Buckman is important. What happened in Buckman? Here is a nice summary: “In Buckman, the plaintiffs brought state