Our firm serves as national coordinating counsel in Zimmer Biomet’s Durom Acetabular Cup hip implant litigation, including MDL No. 2158 in the District of New Jersey, numerous companion state court cases and Canadian class action litigation. Our firm has secured multiple trial wins, stayed discovery and structured a global settlement program to resolve over 1,000 cases and claims.
Of the four cases that have gone to trial, Zimmer Biomet has prevailed with full defense verdicts in three and secured a new trial on the judgment amount in the fourth through post-trial proceedings. In the first Durom Cup bellwether trial in November 2014, a 12-person jury returned a verdict in favor of Zimmer Biomet in the case of John Pugliese v. Zimmer, Inc. The case was tried in St. Clair County, Illinois — a challenging judicial district for defendants in the U.S. After a three-week trial, the jury unanimously ruled for Zimmer Biomet on all claims filed by the plaintiff, which related to the hip-replacement product, the Durom Acetabular Cup (Durom Cup). Our firm served as lead trial counsel in this victory.
Our product liability team achieved a second Durom Cup trial win for Zimmer Biomet – and the first at the federal level – when in May 2015, an eight-person jury returned a unanimous verdict in favor of Zimmer Biomet in the case of Christine Brady v. Zimmer, Inc., tried in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey. Specifically, the jury found that the statute of limitations from Brady’s home state of Louisiana nullified all claims filed by the plaintiff and ended the case, which was scheduled for three more weeks of trial. This was a major decision for the medical device company as Brady’s case was the plaintiffs’ liaison counsel’s choice to be tried first of the approximately 400 cases pending in the Durom Federal Multidistrict Litigation.
Zimmer Biomet then returned to St. Clair County for the second bellwether and third overall trial in the Durom Cup case, where a jury again rejected plaintiffs’ claims that the hip implant was defective or caused injuries. The 12-person jury rendered a unanimous verdict in favor of Zimmer Biomet in August 2015, after a three-week trial in the case of Mullin v. Zimmer, Inc.
Following these trial victories, we successfully negotiated a strategic stay of discovery and executed a global settlement program to favorably resolve thousands of cases and claims. Among other processes, our firm developed a website (www.Duromsettlement.com) to efficiently administer the settlement program.
