In 2018, our blogpost on In re Johnson & Johnson Talcum Powder Products Marketing, Sales Practices & Liability Litigation, 903 F.3d 278 (3d Cir. 2018), was entitled “Money For Nothing? No Standing This Time in the Third Circuit.” There, it appeared that the Third Circuit had drawn an eminently reasonable bright line disallowing no-injury
If you’ve been practicing in mass torts for any length of time, you’ve probably dealt with MSP Recovery. We’ve posted about this Medicare Secondary Payor Troll many times (most recently here). One of MSP’s typical litigation approaches is to claim it has assignments of rights from certain Medicare Advantage Plans and then assert claims
We have previously analogized that when a case is dismissed for failure to state a claim under Rule 12, that is like the plaintiff not even getting to first base. And that when a complaint is dismissed for lack of standing, a rarer form of dismissal, the plaintiff couldn’t even get up to bat, let
Bexis was a mere college freshman, and a Princeton football manager, on September 28, 1974. In the first game of the season, Rutgers played Princeton at Princeton’s old (and rather decrepit) Palmer Stadium. With about three minutes to go and Rutgers up 6-0, Rutgers fans swarmed the field and tore down both sets of goalposts. When Princeton tied the game up with less than half a minute left, without goalposts we could not kick an extra point. A two point conversion failed, and Rutgers escaped with a tie.
Not quite half a century later, Rutgers scored an actual win. This time Bexis is pleased. In Children’s Health Defense, Inc. v. Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, ___ F.4th ___, 2024 WL 637353 (3d Cir. Feb. 15, 2024) (“CHD”), the Third Circuit affirmed the right of a publicly supported university to require COVID-19 vaccination as a prerequisite to its students’ in-person attendance. We blogged about this outcome in the district court, and its precedential affirmance is even more significant.Continue Reading Tear Down the Goalposts – Rutgers Wins
In our recent ediscovery for defendants update, we highlighted two of the twenty-eight cases we included as the most important: In re Tasigna (Nilotinib) Products Liability Litigation, 2023 WL 6064308 (Mag. M.D. Fla. Sept. 18, 2023), and Davis v. Disability Rights New Jersey, 291 A.3d 812 (N.J. Super. App. Div. March 16, 2023). Today we’re explaining why.Continue Reading The Two Most Significant New Ediscovery for Defendants Decisions
Way back in September 2012, we—in its Blog-specific veiled singular usage—did our first post. We introduced ourselves with some rare first personal singular statements before proceeding to trash a Louisiana intermediate appellate court’s affirmance of a large verdict under Louisiana’s Medical Assistance Programs Integrity Law. Among our criticisms was the lack of detail on
We’ve finished reading through the New Jersey Supreme Court’s unanimous decision in Hrymoc v. Ethicon, Inc., ___ A.3d ___, 2023 WL 4714042 (N.J. July 25, 2023) (which should really be captioned “McGinnis” because plaintiff Hrymoc settled, see n.1). The good – really good – news is that an abusively obtained nuclear ($68 million+) verdict goes bye-bye. That alone is grounds for celebration.Continue Reading Perfect Defense §510(k) Compliance Win in New Jersey May Be Pyrrhic
We’ve blogged before about the plaintiffs’ self-defeating “injury” definition in the Taxotere mass tort litigation. Specifically, plaintiffs have defined their injury as being hair loss that persists more than six months after their cessation of treatment with the defendant’s cancer chemotherapy drug. But, because this litigation (like most product liability MDLs) only exists because of lawyer solicitation, such solicitation dredges up many plaintiffs who sat on their hands for much longer than the aforesaid six month period. Having a date certain as to when the injury exists greatly assists any defendant in winning dismissal of these stale claims on statute of limitations grounds.
That’s not just true in the Taxotere MDLContinue Reading Taxotere Timing Troubles Persistently Plague Plaintiffs
It is looking very much as if the U.S. Supreme Court will hear a case this upcoming October term that will permit it, at long last, to inter the Chevron doctrine. Under that doctrine, if there is ambiguity about the scope of rule making powers provided to an agency by Congress, courts will defer to
We’re happy to report on a couple of favorable decisions involving some of the COVID-19-related issues that the Blog has been covering. We have one each on ivermectin injunctions, Shoemaker v. UPMC, ___ A.3d ___, 2022 WL 4372772 (Pa. Super. Sept. 22, 2022), and vaccine mandates, Children’s Health Defense, Inc. v. Rutgers, 2022 WL 4377515 (D.N.J. Sept. 22, 2022).Continue Reading Two Recent COVID-19 Wins