In Reclast case, Novartis obtains summary judgment based on Daubert exclusion of causation experts’ testimony.
news | February 10, 2017
February 2017 — Hollingsworth LLP flexed its considerable Daubert muscle once again in serial pharma litigation in Jones v Novartis. With the benefit of extensive briefing by Firm partners Stephen A. Klein and Robert E. Johnston, and notwithstanding the expansive pending litigation involving other bisphosphonates, the Jones court detailed the failures of plaintiff’s expert proofs in an extraordinary 119-page Daubert opinion that lays a major blow to any litigation hypothesis that Reclast can cause atypical femur fractures (AFFs). The court excluded as unreliable the causation opinions – including, importantly, general causation – of plaintiff’s bone expert William Hinshaw, statistician Wayne Taylor, and serial plaintiffs’ regulatory expert Suzanne Parisian, along with two of the plaintiff’s treating physicians. The court then followed up with an 18-page opinion giving Novartis a complete summary judgment win.