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PENNSYLVANIA RECORD

Thursday, March 28, 2024

Daniel Fisher News


Court trims the federal government's opioid lawsuit against Amerisource Bergen

By Daniel Fisher |
PHILADELPHIA (Legal Newsline) - A federal judge allowed the government’s lawsuit against drug distributor Amerisource Bergen to proceed, but cut down the potential size of the government’s claims by ruling Amerisource could only be ordered to pay fines over opioids it shipped after Congress amended the Controlled Substances Act in 2018.

Amerisource Bergen attacks 'profoundly flawed' DOJ opioid lawsuit

By Daniel Fisher |
PHILADELPHIA (Legal Newsline) - Amerisource Bergen asked a federal judge to dismiss a Justice Department lawsuit accusing it of filling hundreds of thousands of suspicious opioid orders, saying the government is seeking billions of dollars in fines for violating “hopelessly vague” rules it refuses to identify with any specificity.

Settlement ends Honeywell's 'ill-fated' funding of asbestos trust; Company claimed lawyers were bleeding it dry

By Daniel Fisher |
ERIE, Pa. (Legal Newsline) - Likening the two sides to exhausted boxers or a quarreling couple, a bankruptcy judge approved a settlement between Honeywell and trustees overseeing a fund for paying asbestos claimants under which Honeywell will end its involvement for a lump-sum payment of $1.3 billion.

Latest opioid ruling puts MDL judge further out of step on public nuisance

By Daniel Fisher |
A federal judge soundly rejected the “public nuisance” theory behind most opioid litigation, further isolating the judge in charge of thousands of similar lawsuits who has consistently ruled in favor of plaintiffs on this very question.

More clients sue Hagens Berman over failed birth defect lawsuits

By Daniel Fisher |
PHILADELPHIA (Legal Newsline) - Prominent plaintiff law firm Hagens Berman has been sued by more of its clients who claim they were shoved aside by their lawyers after serious ethical concerns emerged in how the firm handled lawsuits over the banned drug thalidomide.

Lawyer fights lender who advanced cash against NFL concussion fees

By Daniel Fisher |
PHILADELPHIA (Legal Newsline) - A lawyer who represented hundreds of players in a $1 billion concussion settlement with the National Football League is fighting an arbitrator’s order to repay some $2.3 million in high-interest loans from a litigation funder.

Major plaintiffs firm will have to disclose ethics info in failed thalidomide litigation

By Daniel Fisher |
PHILADELPHIA (Legal Newsline) - Prominent plaintiffs’ law firm Hagens Berman can’t use the attorney-client privilege to shield information it gave to an outside ethics expert hired to defend the firm against claims it improperly pursued thalidomide claims despite strong evidence they were barred by the statute of limitations.

Mashup of federal and state laws impossible to obey, Johnson & Johnson tells U.S. Supreme Court

By Daniel Fisher |
WASHINGTON (Legal Newsline) - Johnson & Johnson has asked the U.S. Supreme Court hear its appeal of a $70 million jury verdict over its antipsychotic drug Risperdal, saying it is impossible to comply with state and federal law at the same time in such cases.

Plaintiffs lawyer rips colleagues over multidistrict litigation fees, pressure tactics

By Daniel Fisher |
PHILADELPHIA (Legal Newsline) - Federal multidistrict litigation, a procedure intended to resolve mass-tort lawsuits fairly and efficiently, has mutated into an unethical moneymaking machine for lawyers that is badly in need of reform, a prominent plaintiff attorney says as he prepares to lobby for changes.

Pa. opioid lawsuits plod along as companies demand 'critical information to defend themselves'

By Daniel Fisher |
MEDIA (Legal Newsline) - Drug distributors facing about 50 opioid lawsuits in Pennsylvania have asked the judge overseeing the litigation to order sanctions against plaintiffs for repeatedly refusing to honor deadlines to turn over evidence including information about how state and local governments have handled the opioid crisis they blame on the drug industry.

Lawsuit: Eckert Seamans helped criminal scam investors

By Daniel Fisher |
MIAMI (Legal Newsline) - A large regional law firm has been sued for allegedly facilitating a multimillion-dollar fraud by Par Funding, a company that extended high-interest loans to retail businesses but failed amid claims its principals squandered money and hid a founder’s criminal past.

Judge rejects Hagens Berman’s `emergency’ request to halt lawsuit by Thalidomide client

By Daniel Fisher |
PHILADELPHIA (Legal Newsline) - Saying a claimed “emergency” might be more of a delaying tactic, the judge overseeing a lawsuit by a disgruntled former client of the law firm Hagens Berman rejected a request to halt the proceedings while the firm appeals his ruling denying a venue change out of his court.“The sky has not fallen,” wrote U.S.

Vets elbow smaller firm out of class action despite being late to the party

By Daniel Fisher |
PITTSBURGH (Legal Newsline) - A federal magistrate has sided with plaintiffs firm Berger Montague over a relative newcomer to consumer class actions, handing the Philadelphia law firm control of a case that has produced allegations of collusion, conspiracy and misleading advertising.

Hagens Berman redacts entire ethics report in failed thalidomide litigation

By Daniel Fisher |
A special master investigating how the prominent class action firm Hagens Berman handled failed lawsuits over the banned morning sickness drug thalidomide has chastised the firm in unusually strong terms for redacting the entire report it commissioned from an ethics expert, down to the letterhead and page numbers.

Lawyer's sting-op on classaction.org ad leads to vicious fight for control of InventHelp lawsuit

By Daniel Fisher |
PITTSBURGH (Legal Newsline) - A fight for control over a proposed class action has descended into nasty attacks and counterattacks, as the lawyer who filed the first case accuses the prominent Philadelphia law firm Berger Montague of colluding with the defense and Berger Montague accuses her of being a “silly” and unqualified conspiracy theorist.

As thalidomide lawsuits collapse, major plaintiffs firm is sued by its own client

By Daniel Fisher |
PHILADELPHIA (Legal Newsline) - A long-simmering fight between the prominent plaintiffs’ law firm Hagens Berman Sobol Shapiro and several unhappy clients has escalated into open war as one of them sued her former lawyers for allegedly misleading her about the chances of winning a lawsuit based on decades-old claims of being exposed to the dangerous morning-sickness drug thalidomide.

Judge: PFAS chemicals aren't 'hazardous' under Pennsylvania law

By Daniel Fisher |
PHILADELPHIA (Legal Newsline) - The U.S. Navy has won a key victory in Pennsylvania as a judge recently dismissed a lawsuit over the ubiquitous chemicals known as PFAS after finding they weren’t defined as “hazardous” under the state’s toxic waste statute.

Ohio AG to colleagues: Let's limit fees to private lawyers in opioid settlement

By Daniel Fisher |
COLUMBUS, Ohio (Legal Newsline) - Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost has warned his fellow AGs that a reported $50 billion settlement of opioid claims will fall apart unless the states demand tight controls on fees to private lawyers and make sure the rest of the money is directed toward programs designed to address the opioid crisis, instead of state general funds.

Battle between states and cities for opioid money escalates as Ohio AG makes play for control of litigation

By Daniel Fisher |
CINCINNATI (Legal Newsline) - Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost has asked a federal appeals court to halt or dismiss the first two bellwether trials in opioid multidistrict litigation, in a major escalation of the long-brewing fight between state AGs and cities/counties seeking their own share of opioid lawsuit proceeds.

Oklahoma judge feeds the 'monster' with $572M opioid ruling against Johnson & Johnson

By Daniel Fisher |
Sixteen years ago in a case involving gunmaker Sturm, Ruger & Co., a New York appeals court refused to apply public nuisance law against the manufacturer of a legal product, saying that doing so would transform nuisance law “into a monster that would devour in one gulp the entire law of tort.”