North Carolina Product Liability Lawyer Blog

Articles Posted in Jury Verdicts

Depuy Pinnacle Hip Trial: Jury Awards ONE BILLION DOLLARS

Published on: December 2, 2016 | By Clay Hodges

Staggering. It’s really the only word for it. Yesterday a Texas jury awarded six plaintiffs over one billion dollars for injuries sustained following the failure of the Depuy Pinnacle metal-on-metal artificial hip. And that comes out to more than $170,000,000.00 per plaintiff. The verdict was handed down last night following ten weeks of punishing trial.

This trial was the third “bellwether” case in the Depuy Pinnacle MDL (multidistrict litigation). The first Pinnacle bellwether trial ended in a defense verdict, which means the jury did not find negligence on the part of the defendants, Depuy Orthopaedics and Johnson & Johnson, and therefore the plaintiffs received no compensation. The second bellwether trial resulted in a huge $502 million dollar verdict for five plaintiffs, which I wrote about here. In fact, much of the speculation about this third bellwether trial was whether the plaintiffs’ team could put on the same powerful case that they did in the second bellwether trial, or whether the $500 million verdict in March was simply a bizarre outlier, one of those remarkable unicorn verdicts that come along once and never again.

Today, the $500 million dollar verdict seems modest compared to yesterday’s jury verdict. Plainly, juries are sending a huge message to Depuy and J&J that they hurt many people when they marketed and sold the Depuy Pinnacle Hip.

Depuy Pinnacle Hip Case: Judge Reduces Jury Award by $350 Million

Published on: August 25, 2016 | By Clay Hodges

In March 2016 five people injured by the Depuy Pinnacle metal-on-metal artificial hip scored a huge courtroom victory. In that case a Texas jury awarded five plaintiffs $502,043,908.00 for injuries suffered by the failure of the Depuy Pinnacle hip. That figure was divided in different ways to the five injured people. Of that amount, $360,000,000.00 was awarded by the jury for punitive damages. The jury concluded that the Pinnacle hip sold by Depuy was defective and that Depuy knew about the flaws but did not adequately warn patients and their doctors of the risks. Like I said, this was a huge win. Unfortunately, the punitive damages award did not last long.

Judge Forced to Reduce Punitive Damages Award

Punitive damages are money damages, separate from compensatory damages, which are awarded by a jury and which are intended to punish or deter a bad-acting defendant and others from engaging in similar conduct. Judge Kinkeade, who is the federal judge presiding over the Depuy Pinnacle multi-district litigation (MDL), stated that he was bound by a Texas statute which puts a limit or “cap” on the amount of punitive damages a jury can award. Thus, Judge Kinkeade was required by law to reduce the punitive damages award, which a jury of twelve individuals, after a 42 day trial, thought was appropriate.

Thank You, Tort Reform!

I Won My Product Liability Trial, Now Manufacturer Has Filed an Appeal!

Published on: July 22, 2016 | By Clay Hodges

To paraphrase Yogi Berra, your lawsuit ain’t over till it’s over.

In a product liability case, most lawsuits end in a settlement. The plaintiff and the defendants work the case for a period of time, and eventually they sit down and hammer out a resolution to end the case. However, some product liability cases make it all the way to trial. I have written about jury verdicts in medical device and drug cases often on this site. Recently, for example, a young boy and his family won a whopping $70,000,000.00 verdict against Johnson & Johnson based on the boy’s disfigurement caused by the drug Risperdal. In that case, as in so many others, you may think that after years of litigation and after winning a complex jury trial that the plaintiff can finally leave the court system behind and get on with his life. But the case, sadly, may just be getting started. When medical device manufacturers and drug makers lose a big case with a large money award, expect them to throw the kitchen sink at you after the jury reaches its verdict. Let’s look a few things a defense team could do if it loses a big product liability case.

Judge Denies Motion to Delay Depuy Pinnacle Hip Trials

Published on: June 20, 2016 | By Clay Hodges

They say justice delayed is justice denied. Apparently Judge Kinkeade in the Depuy Pinnacle Artificial Hip MDL thinks so. On June 10, 2016, Judge Kinkeade denied Depuy’s motion to delay all future trials until the company completes its appeal of a massive $500 million jury verdict.

Depuy Orthopaedics and its parent company Johnson & Johnson filed their “motion to stay” on May 24, 2016. They asked the court to delay all further trials in the Depuy Pinnacle MDL until an appellate court rules on their appellate issues. (It is very common for a company in any case to appeal a trial verdict when the jury awards significant damages to the plaintiffs.) Depuy claimed there were significant errors made at the trial. Depuy also argued that the decision in the appeal could have “far-reaching implications” on how future Pinnacle cases are tried. Defendants claimed the “grounds for appeal are strong” and that they “acted appropriately and responsibly in the design and testing” of the devices.

Judge Kinkeade, who presides over the Depuy Pinnacle MDL in Dallas, Texas, denied the motion to stay the trials. In his order Judge Kinkeade selected seven bellwether cases to be tried beginning September 6, 2016. You can read that Order here.

Depuy Pinnacle Artificial Hip Litigation: Defendants Seek Delay of New Trials

Published on: June 8, 2016 | By Clay Hodges

A request by Depuy Orthopaedics Inc. to delay more trials concerning its Depuy Pinnacle hip implants is pending in the federal court in charge of thousands of cases against the company. The request came from Depuy on May 24. Depuy asks the Court to hold off on further trials until an appeal of one large case tried in March is resolved. That case, which I wrote about here and here, resulted in a stunning $502 million verdict for five people injured by the defective artificial hip components. So Depuy is plainly motivated to delay, if not overturn, the award. If the request is granted it will take much longer for other plaintiffs to have their cases tried, as complex appeals like this one can take years to resolve. As the saying goes, justice delayed is justice denied. I hope federal judge Ed Kinkeade in Texas denies Depuy’s motion. These remaining cases deserve their day in court.

Depuy and the other defendants claim their planned appeal could have “far-reaching implications” on how future cases are tried. Defendants claim the “grounds for appeal are strong” and that they “acted appropriately and responsibly in the design and testing” of the devices.

Transvaginal Mesh Lawsuits: $4.4 Million Jury Verdict, Appeal of $11.1 Million Award

Published on: May 6, 2016 | By Clay Hodges

(Part 6)

Let’s get back to a look at recent developments with transvaginal mesh lawsuits. In two big victories recently, a Georgia jury awarded $4.4 million to a woman injured by transvaginal mesh, and a New Jersey appeals court upheld an $11.11 million dollar jury verdict.

Transvaginal mesh (TVM) is a plastic mesh product that has been implanted in women for many years to support weakened vaginal walls. Many women suffer from pelvic organ prolapse or stress urinary incontinence, and makers of TVM have insisted that TVM could repair these medical problems. Unfortunately, not long after TVM was marketed and sold, women began complaining of serious health problems, including erosion of the vaginal wall, infections, painful sex, and bladder perforation. The lawsuits followed.

Now let’s take a look at a recent jury trial and an appeal decision of an earlier jury verdict.

$8.9 Million Stripped by Judge From Plaintiff in Wright Conserve Hip Case

Published on: April 19, 2016 | By Clay Hodges

A lawsuit can be a minefield. For one, it can go on for years. And in that time opposing counsel can (and will) challenge a person’s lawsuit in large and small ways. By large I mean bringing “dispositive motions,” which are motions that “dispose” of a case, like a motion to dismiss and a motion for summary judgment. These motions are defensive attempts to kick a lawsuit out of court before it reaches a jury. By small I mean opposing counsel may refuse to produce certain documents or information in the “discovery” process, or may simply use motions or other tools to slow down and delay the plaintiff’s opportunity to have her case reach a jury.

But the fight is not over when the jury reaches a verdict in a product liability case. If a plaintiff wins her lawsuit, the defense will typically file “post-trial motions,” and after those motions are heard will likely appeal to a higher court. Merely getting a good jury verdict is by no means the end of the story.

Two weeks ago, a federal judge in Georgia stepped in after a jury verdict and stripped almost nine million dollars of punitive damages from the amount of money the jury awarded to the injured plaintiff.

But I need to back up.

In Re: Wright Medical Technology Inc. Conserve Hip Implant Products Liability Litigation (MDL No. 2329); Christiansen, No. 13-00297 (N.D. Ga.)

Jury Awards Astonishing $502 Million to Five Depuy Pinnacle Hip Victims

Published on: March 22, 2016 | By Clay Hodges

The ground moved on March 17, 2016. In a Dallas Texas courtroom a federal jury ordered Depuy Orthopaedics and Johnson & Johnson to pay five unfairly injured people $502 million dollars, including a stunning $360 million in punitive damages. The jury based this award on findings that Depuy hid critical defects in the design of the Depuy Pinnacle artificial hip system and hid these risks from doctors and patients.

I’ve written about this case before (In re: DePuy Orthopaedics Inc. Pinnacle Hip Implant Products Liability Litigation, 11-md-02244, U.S. District Court, Northern District of Texas (Dallas)). Five plaintiffs (Aoki, Christopher, Greer, Klusmann, Peterson) agreed to have their cases tried together. This was not a “class action” lawsuit. Rather, because the five individual cases had sufficient similarities, the judge, parties, and attorneys agreed to try all five cases in one jury trial. The single jury heard all the evidence in these cases, but Judge Ed Kinkeade instructed the jury to consider liability in each individual case, and to award separate damages for each plaintiff. Boy did they.

$360,000,000 in Punitive Damages

Five patients implanted with the Depuy Pinnacle artificial hip were awarded $502,000,000.00. The jury concluded that the Pinnacle hip sold by Depuy was defective and that Depuy knew about the flaws but did not warn patients and their doctors of the risks. The jury awarded $142,000,000.00 in actual damages and $360,000,000.00 in punitive damages.

Depuy is owned by parent company Johnson & Johnson, who will be on the hook for paying this judgment.

Depuy Pinnacle Hip Cases Currently Being Tried to Jury in Texas

Published on: February 2, 2016 | By Clay Hodges

There is a very important Depuy Pinnacle hip case being tried in Dallas, Texas as I write this.

The federal court system has consolidated many of the Depuy Pinnacle lawsuits into one multidistrict litigation in the North District of Texas (3:11-md-02244) presided over by federal judge Ed Kinkeade.

Bellwether Cases

Back in August, Judge Kinkeade selected certain cases as “bellwether selections” and ordered the parties to organize those cases for jury trials. Bellwether cases are representative cases which have broad characteristics in common with many of the remaining cases.

So Judge Kinkeade ordered that five separate cases would be consolidated into one (very large) jury trial, to start January 8. Those five plaintiffs are:

Aoki
Christopher
Greer
Klusmann
Peterson

One jury will hear all the evidence in these cases, but the judge will allow the jury to consider liability in each case, and to award separate damages in each case. Based on court filings, all five plaintiffs are from Texas, and each case has many similarities, thus making them amenable to trying together. In the language of the law, these five cases have “common issues of law and fact.” Opening arguments began January 11. The case is supposed to last three months.

Recent Transvaginal Mesh Trials: Two Losses, One Win for Injured Women (Part 4)

Published on: January 15, 2016 | By Clay Hodges

We’ve been looking at recent trial results in transvaginal mesh cases. In this (fourth) post we review two verdicts from October 2015, where juries concluded that the mesh manufacturers were not negligent. Thus, these injured women received no money for the failure of the transvaginal mesh. In a third case, decided on December 21, 2015, the jury awarded $12,500,000.00 to an injured woman. I will take a look at all three cases:

Cavness v. Kowalczyk et al. (Texas District Court, Dallas)

Product: Gynecare Prosima Pelvic Floor Repair System

Key Product Defendants: Ethicon, Inc. and Johnson & Johnson.

Jury Award: zero.

Date of Jury Verdict: October 5, 2015

Key Takeaway: A big win for Ethicon and Johnson & Johnson, defendants in the case.

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I was involved in a case for the faulty hip replacements. Clay Hodges represented me. I can't say enough about how much he has helped me. Clay was able to win multiple settlements on my behalf with most of them being the maximum amount able to be awarded. Matt J.

Clay, thank you sir for making a disheartening experience at least palatable, you and your staff were honest, caring and understanding through the entire process of my wife’s hip replacements, while monetary settlements never make the pain and suffering end, it sometimes is the only way people can fight back to right a wrong. J. V.

We are absolutely pleased with how Clay Hodges handled my husband’s hip replacement claim. He always kept us informed of the progress. And, his work resulted in a settlement which we are extremely pleased. Thank you, Clay! Carol L. & Norm L.