Mealey's Personal Injury : Mealey's : Legal News & Analysis

Mealey's Personal Injury

June 19, 2025
Connecticut Judge To Hold Additional Argument On J&J Successor Liability Question

BRIDGEPORT, Conn. — A Connecticut judge considering punitive damages and motions for a new trial and judgment notwithstanding the verdict in the wake of a $15 million asbestos-talc award ordered parties to come up with dates for additional argument on the issue of successor liability for Johnson & Johnson, choice of law and the status of LLT Management LLC as a defendant.
June 19, 2025
N.Y. Federal Judge Grants Gunmaker Summary Judgment After Excluding Expert

NEW YORK — A New York federal judge excluded testimony from an expert retained by a man who suffered an eye injury while shooting a Smith & Wesson revolver and granted the manufacturer summary judgment, finding that without that testimony, the man’s claims fail.
June 16, 2025
10th Circuit Affirms Experts Properly Excluded In Gun Design Defect Case

DENVER — The 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on June 13 affirmed summary judgment for a gun manufacturer after finding that the experts retained by a man who accidentally shot himself while removing a handgun from its holster based their causation opinions on speculation and were properly excluded as inadmissible under Federal Rule of Evidence 702.
June 16, 2025
$46.4M Jury Award To Jiu-Jitsu Student Stands As State High Court Denies Review

SAN FRANCISCO — A $46,475,112.33 California jury award to a man who suffered a spinal cord injury that rendered him paraplegic while training at a jiu-jitsu studio, which will become some $56 million with postjudgment interest due, will stand after the California Supreme Court denied a petition for review of the state appellate court decision upholding the verdict.
June 13, 2025
Distributor Of Authorized Generic Drugs Dismissed From Depo-Provera MDL

PENSACOLA, Fla. — The Florida federal judge overseeing the Depo-Provera multidistrict litigation, a group of cases alleging that a long-lasting injectable contraceptive caused women to develop intracranial meningiomas, a type of brain tumor, on June 12 signed a stipulated order dismissing a generic drug distributor from all cases.
June 13, 2025
Couple Seeks Damages For Kids’ Lead Poisoning Caused By Living In National Park

CHEYENNE, Wyo. — A that couple has sued the U.S. government in Wyoming federal court contending that while they were living in government housing related to the husband’s employment at Yellowstone National Park, their two children developed lead poisoning. The couple says the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) is liable for money damages for personal injury under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA).
June 12, 2025
Experts On Firearms, Suicide Risks Can Testify In Suit By Walmart Employee’s Family

GREENBELT, Md. — A Maryland federal magistrate judge agreed to limit testimony from experts retained by the family of a Walmart employee who killed himself with a gun he purchased at the Walmart where he worked, finding that the experts cannot offer legal conclusions or use specialized legal terminology in their testimony.
June 11, 2025
Monsanto Appeals Denial Of Its Bid To Reduce $75M PCB Punitive Damages Award

SEATTLE — Monsanto has filed a notice in Washington state court that it is appealing a state court judge’s denial of its motion to reduce a $75 million punitive damages award that was part of a combined verdict of $100 million for injuries from exposure to polychlorinated biphenyls(PCBs) at a Seattle area school. In addition to the trial court’s final judgment on the ruling, Monsanto is appealing other decisions, including rulings on its bid for a new trial.
June 10, 2025
Washington Supreme Court Lowers Deliberate Injury Standard For Latent Diseases

SEATTLE — A divided Washington Supreme Court overturned precedent requiring actual knowledge that a disease will arise, saying that in latent disease cases such as mesothelioma, employees need only show that it was a virtual certainty that a disease would arise to sue employers under the deliberate injury exception to the workers’ compensation system.
June 09, 2025
Texas Jury Awards $9.45 Million For Fall Into Unlit Empty Hotel Fountain

DALLAS — A Texas jury awarded a man $9,451,000 in compensatory and exemplary damages after finding a hotel he had been staying in liable for injuries he suffered falling into an empty fountain that was level with surrounding ground but concealed by darkness and a lack of illumination.
June 09, 2025
Dead Smoker’s Husband, Philip Morris Settle Wrongful Death Suit

WOBURN, Mass. — The widower of a smoker, tobacco company Philip Morris USA Inc. (PM) and local retailers that sold the smoker Marlboro Lights entered a notice of settlement just days into a wrongful death trial in Massachusetts state court where the widower had told jurors his wife smoked light cigarettes because she thought they were healthier before dying from lung cancer at age 64. VIDEO OF THE TRIAL IS AVAILABLE.
June 06, 2025
New York Jury Awards $117M For World Trade Center Asbestos Exposures

NEW YORK — A justice adopted a stipulated post-trial schedule that will see post-trial briefing wrap up in September after a New York jury awarded a couple $117 million for a man’s exposure to asbestos during construction of the World Trade Center, sources told Mealey Publications.
June 03, 2025
Panel Affirms $475K Judgment For Personal Injury Plaintiff In Wire Fraud ‘Scam’

SAN DIEGO — In what it said was a case of first impression, a California appellate court affirmed a lower court’s judgment for a personal injury plaintiff in a dispute with a restaurant and its employees over who bears the risk of loss when an “imposter” caused a $475,000 personal injury settlement to be wired to an unknown third party instead of the plaintiff, finding that evidence shows that “red flags should have alerted” the restaurant and the employees “to the fraud, and that there were none that should have alerted plaintiff.”
May 30, 2025
Unsafe Marlboros Lights Made Smoker Increase Habit Before Cancer, Jury Told

WOBURN, Mass. — The widower of a smoker told a Massachusetts state court jury during opening arguments in a wrongful death lawsuit against tobacco company Philip Morris USA Inc. (PM) and local retailers that the defendants sold defective Marlboro Lights that the decedent thought were healthier but which kept her hooked on smoking until she developed fatal lung cancer and died at age 64. VIDEO OF THE TRIAL IS AVAILABLE.
May 30, 2025
Michigan Supreme Court: Attorney Fee Sanction Allowed Under Then-Court Rule

LANSING, Mich. — The Michigan Supreme Court has reversed dismissal of a $169,512 attorney fee sanction in a dental malpractice case, saying the trial court correctly applied a court rule allowing such an award that was in effect during the pendency of the case.
May 28, 2025
Missouri Panel Affirms $549.9M Award Against Monsanto In Roundup Cancer Lawsuit

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — An appellate court panel in Missouri ruled May 27 that a trial court did not commit evidentiary errors and that the $549.9 million in punitive damages, awarded by a jury for three plaintiffs who sued Monsanto Co. alleging that exposure to the herbicide Roundup caused their cancers, is not excessive.
May 28, 2025
Philips Loses Bid To Dismiss Complaint Alleging That CPAP Machine Caught Fire

RALEIGH, N.C. — A federal judge in North Carolina refused to dismiss a complaint brought against a manufacturer of a continuous positive air pressure (CPAP) sleep apnea device that allegedly caught fire, causing a woman to suffer second degree burns on her face and her home to burn down, after finding that the woman’s daughter is the duly authorized representative of her estate.
May 23, 2025
Depo-Provera MDL Judge Says Complaints Must Identify Requisite Injury And Product

PENSACOLA, Fla. — The Florida federal judge overseeing the Depo-Provera multidistrict litigation, a group of cases alleging that a long-lasting injectable contraceptive caused women to develop intracranial meningiomas, a type of brain tumor, outlined what complaints must contain to be included in the MDL and identified potential deficiencies in complaints that have been filed.
May 22, 2025
Louisiana Federal Judge Limits Medical Causation Testimony In Accident Case

NEW ORLEANS — A medical expert retained in a car accident case may be qualified to opine on certain injuries, but portions of his testimony are inadmissible as unreliable under Federal Rule of Evidence 702 and Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals Inc., a Louisiana federal judge found.
May 21, 2025
‘Death-Penalty’ Sanctions Over Discovery Not Merited, Texas Supreme Court Finds

AUSTIN, Texas — A trial court abused its discretion by issuing discovery sanctions in the form of striking the defendant’s pleadings in a vehicular negligence suit, the Texas Supreme Court ruled, holding that there was no evidence of bad faith or intentional concealment that would justify a “death-penalty” sanction that essentially causes a party to lose the case.
May 21, 2025
Expert Can Testify On Reasonableness Of Medical Costs, Miss. Federal Judge Says

JACKSON, Miss. — A man who alleges that he was injured in a traffic accident lost his bid to exclude an expert retained by a company who disputed the reasonable costs of the man’s necessary medical treatment as a result of the collision when a Mississippi federal judge denied his motion to exclude.
May 16, 2025
Man Hurt In Accident Loses Bid To Exclude Defense’s Expert In Texas Crash Suit

SAN ANTONIO — A Texas magistrate judge denied two motions to exclude experts retained in an automobile accident without prejudice, finding that the trial court should be “able to consider specific objections to aspects of their testimony as they arise at trial and/or through any motions in limine.”
May 15, 2025
Colorado Supreme Court: Driver’s Medical Records Protected By Privilege

DENVER — A truck driver who is the defendant in a wrongful death suit properly claimed physician-patient privilege in his emergency room medical records, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled, including facts about the underlying auto accident that may not specifically relate to the treatment of his injuries.
May 14, 2025
Tennessee High Court: Peer- Review Privilege Waived In Items Disclosed To Family

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — Acknowledging that discussions and materials from a hospital’s quality improvement committee (QIC) over a patient's care and death were privileged under state law as a form of peer-review privilege, the Tennessee Supreme Court ruled that this privilege was waived in any materials disclosed to a decedent’s family at a subsequent meeting.
May 09, 2025
Boston Court Enters $13M Judgment In Favor Of Dead Smoker’s Estate

BOSTON — The Suffolk County, Mass., Superior Court on May 8 entered judgment in favor of a dead smoker’s estate worth more than $13 million in compensatory and punitive damages after a jury found in favor of the estate on its claim that a tobacco company’s “power of coercion conspiracy” caused the smoker’s lung cancer and death. VIDEO FROM THE TRIAL IS AVAILABLE.