It’s hardly surprising that Johnson & Johnson has hired a small army of lawyers to defend it in the many product liability cases it’s facing, including the one that ended in a $1 billion verdict last week. What’s more interesting, however, is J&J’s approach to putting together its trial teams. The pharma giant keeps switching its lead counsel—a sign that J&J thinks that it should be winning these cases, lawyers say.
New Brunswick, New Jersey-based J&J is facing thousands of cases relating to the allegedly defective hip implant devices made by DePuy Orthopaedics Inc., which J&J acquired in 1998. J&J won the first so-called bellwether jury trial in October 2014, but the company has struggled since. In March, a federal jury in Dallas awarded a $502 million verdict to five plaintiffs, which was later reduced to about $150 million. And this month, the company was hit with a $1 billion punitive damages verdict, which is also sure to be reduced. A fourth case has been scheduled for September.
