Becton Dickinson agrees to settle about 38,000 hernia mesh suits
By Brendan Pierson
Oct 3 (Reuters) -Becton Dickinson BDX.N has agreed to resolve nearly all U.S. lawsuits by people who say they were injured by its hernia repair mesh, about 38,000 cases, in an unusual settlement overseen jointly by state and federal courts, promising an end to litigation stretching back almost two decades.
Terms of the settlement, which the company announced on Wednesday, were not disclosed. BD said the amount was a "large majority" of what it had already set aside for product liability litigation, which was $1.7 billion according to its last quarterly report.
The company said the payouts would take place over several years, with the first before the end of this year.
Almost 25,000 of the cases are centralized in federal court in Columbus, Ohio, with the remainder centralized in state court in Providence, Rhode Island. Plaintiffs will be able to opt out of the settlement, though plaintiffs' lawyers said they expected a very high rate of participation.
BD said it did not admit wrongdoing and would defend itself against any cases by plaintiffs who do not take part in the settlement.
Tim O'Brien of Levin Papantonio and Kelsey Stokes of Fleming Nolen & Jez, lead lawyers for the federal court plaintiffs, said in a joint statement that they were "pleased that the global resolution and resulting process will afford so many individuals a measure of justice."
Don Migliori of Motley Rice, a lead attorney for the plaintiffs in Rhode Island, said that while there have been combined state and federal settlements in mass tort litigation before, the degree of coordination between federal and state courts and attorneys in the mesh cases was unique.
Special masters appointed by both courts will work together to administer claims, and the claims process will be substantially the same for plaintiffs no matter where their case is pending, according to Migliori.
"I think this is the first truly comprehensive effort to have the two judges work together," he said.
The first hernia mesh cases were filed in 2006 in state court in Rhode Island, where hernia mesh maker Davol was headquartered. BD bought Davol's parent company, C.R. Bard, in 2017.
The products at issue are flexible mesh made of polypropylene that are implanted to repair hernias. Plaintiffs say their mesh implants degraded in their bodies and caused a variety of injuries, including infection, chronic pain and organ damage.
Of four cases that went to trial, three resulted in verdicts for the plaintiffs - for $255,000 and $500,000 in federal court, and $4.8 million in state court. The company won another trial, which was in federal court.
The federal MDL is In re: Davol Inc/C.R. Bard Inc Polypropylene Hernia Mesh Products Liability Litigation, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio, No. 18-md-02846.
The Rhode Island litigation is In re: Davol/C.R. Bard hernia mesh multi-case management, Rhode Island Superior Court, No. PC-2018-9999.
For the plaintiffs: Tim O'Brien of Levin Papantonio and Kelsey Stokes, Fleming Nolen & Jez in Ohio; Don Migliori and Jonathan Orent of Motley Rice in Rhode Island
For BD: Michael Brown of Reed Smith
Read more:
R.I. jury orders Becton Dickinson to pay $4.8 mln in hernia mesh trial
Becton Dickinson ordered to pay $255k in hernia mesh trial
(Reporting By Brendan Pierson in New York)
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