Practices: Life Sciences Litigation

Of Ungaretti & Harris’ 50+ litigators, nearly half focus primarily on defending claims of personal injuries as the result of alleged negligence or defects involving medical devices, pharmaceuticals, toxic substances and chemical exposure. These matters range from defending single plaintiff claims to serving as Regional and National Counsel.

Michael J. Philippi and Ethan E. Trull co-chair the Ungaretti & Harris Life Sciences Litigation Group. Mike also chairs the overall Litigation Department and has been a member of the firm’s Executive Committee for the last 10 years. He has served as National and Regional Counsel for Fortune 500 healthcare clients in cases involving medical devices including latex gloves, hydrocephalic shunts, arthroscopic shavers and chemical exposures to asbestos and benzene. He has defended individual plaintiff claims involving life sciences matters, including serving on trial teams and as lead trial counsel. Ethan was a senior member of Cardinal Health’s litigation group for 12 years before becoming a partner at Ungaretti & Harris. While at Cardinal he was responsible for the successful defense of claims involving billions of dollars of exposure. During the past four years, he has brought that unique experience and perspective to bear on behalf of our clients, successfully handling scores of cases involving claims of defect and negligence in the medical and life science arena.

MASS TORTS
We have successfully served as national and regional counsel in many mass torts and recurring litigation involving devices, drugs and toxic exposure. We believe that the skill set required in acting as national counsel is significantly different from that required for defending individual cases. Certainly, the same issues of causation, junk science and damages play out in either capacity. But in our national and regional roles, we have learned to create blueprint defense strategies, create and build expert banks, pretrial motions libraries, deposition and trial examination outlines and develop and maintain defense strategies to discredit plaintiff experts--essentially, to develop prepackaged pretrial and trial playbooks that competent trial counsel can use to quickly get up to speed for any given trial.

Some examples of our mass tort work include:

Latex Glove Litigation
We had primary responsibility for more than 800 defective design and failure to warn claims involving latex gloves made by a leading global health products and services provider. After originally serving as one of six regional defense counsel, we:

Were appointed as national coordinating defense counsel;
Were appointed coordination counsel of California and Illinois “mini MDL” cases;
Served on several trial teams in state and federal trials;
Achieved a defense verdict after a five-week federal jury trial that was the first trial out of approximately 2,000 in multi-district litigation to be remanded back to federal court from the multi-district litigation for trial; and
Resolved all of the remaining claims through negotiation and settlement at an average settlement number that was less than 0.5% of the pretrial demand in the jury trial that resulted in the defense verdict referenced above.

We have also served as national counsel for clients with claims involving:

Asbestos in manufactured products and in buildings;
Lead paint;
PCBs;
Benzene and dioxin; and
Pesticides.

Some additional examples of our experience in large, multiple plaintiff actions include:

Defending multiple claims of injury due to allegations of a defective medical device used in arthroscopic surgery.
Defending multiple claims of death and injury resulting from alleged defects in hydrocephalic shunts.
Acting as national coordinating counsel for drug-maker in responding to claims resulting from asthma drug products.
Resolving an action by 10,000 current or former residents of the Chicago Housing Authority’s Altgeld Gardens Housing Project alleging health problems such as asthma and cancer from PCB exposure. Our use of written discovery and deposition by written question resulted in dismissal of 6,500 claims for non-compliance. We also used motion practice to dismiss injuries not linked to PCBs by a medical study, bar certain plaintiff’s experts, and isolate one plaintiff as a test case (in which the court declared a mistrial). The mass action settled for 2% of the plaintiffs’ original demands, with no money paid directly to the plaintiffs.
Representing manufacturers of automotive and industrial equipment, some of whose products contained asbestos. The operations were originally part of a parent company no longer in existence, and the parent was originally covered by liability insurance that our clients believed was still in effect. The coverage dispute involved complex issues of assignment and successorship under the policies. Such issues go to the heart of many claims disputes, and we have the experience to litigate claims and coverage questions extending back over decades.
Representing a historical distributor of benzene in long latency claims of myelodysplasia by chemical laboratory and other employees.
Representing a major oil company in over 100 environmental claims in Illinois, Iowa and Nebraska alleged to have resulted from claims of underground storage tank leakages.

REPRESENTATIVE CASES
Our attorneys have significant experience in defending individual matters involving claims of negligence or defect in the healthcare arena. Some of the specific matters that we have handled include:

Representing a healthcare company specializing in drug delivery technologies in the defense of a product liability action involving claims of inadequate warnings and improper manufacturing for an over-the-counter drug.
Representing a client in a case alleging a faulty back-up warning alarm on a street sweeper in connection with the death of a worker who was run over by the street sweeper.
Representing a manufacturer in multiple plaintiff litigation claiming personal injury resulting from the use of a pain pump to deliver medication into joint spaces.
Representing a Fortune 100 technology company in a products case involving allegations that the plaintiff suffered hearing loss as a result of cell phone usage.
Representing a manufacturer of intrauterine devices in product liability litigation.
Defending a manufacturer of diatomaceous earth in multiple product liability lawsuits involving injuries alleged to have been caused by exposure to radioactive and toxic substances.
Representing a device manufacturer in a case involving a premature infant being treated in a neonatal intensive care unit who was severely burned resulting in a complete loss of his nose and upper lip. As a further result of the extensive burns, the child was unable to swallow and had to be fed through a feeding tube. We successfully mediated and settled this case for a very low seven figure number despite the fact that the case involved horrific and permanent injuries and a very difficult liability defense.
Representing a global healthcare products company in a royalty dispute with a pharmaceutical giant—both of which were Fortune 25 companies. At issue was a new delivery system our client developed that allowed the pharmaceutical company’s drug to become effective immediately upon use. The system was licensed, but when distribution and marketing of it were discontinued our client was still owed substantial royalties under the licensing agreement. Typically, a dispute of this magnitude would lead to years of expensive litigation. However, with only minimum discovery we retained a nationally prominent mediator to conduct a one day binding mediation. The result was a confidential award to our client, but both parties saved millions of dollars in defense costs in what would have otherwise been a very large, very lengthy lawsuit that, like 95% of all lawsuits, would have settled for about the same amount as we achieved in a matter of months.
Representing a hospital pharmacy in a wrongful death and survival claim alleging that the pharmacy’s failure to include auxiliary labels on an IV bag containing a paralytic agent violated the standard of care. Among other experts, we retained the founder of the Institute for Safe Medical Practices–whose text the plaintiff relied on for a standard of care claim–who testified that at the time of the incident the standard of care did not require auxiliary labeling on this medication. The case settled favorably days before trial.

PROFESSIONAL NEGLIGENCE
We also have significant experience representing hospital pharmacies and healthcare professionals in claims arising from medication errors and professional negligence, including:

Representing a national reference laboratory in multiple claims arising from alleged negligent preparation or interpretation of biological samples.
Representing a hospital pharmacy in an infant death case claimed to have been caused by pharmacist misidentification and incorrect compounding of prescribed medication.
Participating in an investigation and root cause analysis of Heparin overdosing in a group of premature infants while in a neonatal intensive care unit.
Representing a hospital pharmacy in a wrongful death case involving claims of failure to include auxiliary warning labels on high risk medication.