A federal jury in Dallas has returned a combined verdict of more than $1 billion on behalf of six people who suffered serious medical complications caused by defective metal-on-metal hip implants made by Johnson & Johnson and its subsidiary DePuy Orthopaedics Inc.
The verdict includes more than $30 million in actual damages for the six plaintiffs and more than $1 billion in punitive damages assessed against Johnson & Johnson and DePuy. The verdict is the third bellwether trial among over 8,000 similar lawsuits nationwide that have been consolidated in multidistrict litigation (MDL) in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas. A bellwether trial is one that is typically representative of all the issues involved in the litigation of a mass tort case. In March 2016, a Dallas jury awarded more than $500 million to five individuals who suffered similar physical and medical complications caused by the controversial Pinnacle hip implant.
We at RisCassi & Davis are pleased by this result. We are currently representing dozens of Connecticut plaintiffs who were harmed by these defective hip products and we are hopeful that this will force Johnson & Johnson and Depuy to reach a global settlement with all injured plaintiffs.