In rulings likely to have repercussions that will reverberate through the 7,300-plus Accutane cases that are centralized in Atlantic County, N.J., Judge Nelson Johnson has dismissed four bellwether cases on statute of limitations grounds.
Johnson, a Superior Court judge who took over Atlantic’s multi-county litigation docket Sept. 1, found that the four plaintiffs, one of whom is a lawyer, failed to show that they learned of their illnesses and the possible connection with Accutane within two years of filing their lawsuits against drugmakers Hoffmann-LaRoche and Roche Laboratories.
