Photo of Blake Thompson

Blake Thompson

Subscribe to Blake Thompson's Posts

Blake serves on the firm’s litigation team, handling complex matters that include asbestos litigation and product liability, among others. He assists in analyzing and investigating risk, and assessing testimony and other discovery productions, so as to determine strategy when clients require guidance on complex litigation.

Contact:Read more about Blake Thompson

On November 9, 2021, the Oklahoma Supreme Court set aside a $465 million verdict against Johnson & Johnson (J&J) in State ex rel. Hunter v. Johnson & Johnson, 2021 OK 54. In 2017, the State of Oklahoma sued three opioid manufacturers, including J&J, alleging the companies deceptively marketed opioids in the state. At trial, only J&J and the claim of public nuisance remained. At the end of a 33-day bench trial, the district court ordered J&J to pay $572 million, representing funding for one year of Oklahoma’s opioid abatement plan. Our previous report on the district court award can be found here. Due to a calculation error in the original award, the district court award was subsequently reduced to $465 million. According to the district court, J&J was liable under Oklahoma’s public nuisance statute for conducting false, misleading, and dangerous marketing campaigns about prescription opioids.

The Eighth Circuit recently held that a motion to dismiss based on forum non conveniens filed 18 months after the start of litigation was untimely. According to the decision, if the forum was truly inconvenient, the defendants should have filed a motion to dismiss earlier than 18 months after the complaint was filed and before the end of discovery.

Map of Illinois.On June 4, the Illinois Supreme Court issued an opinion that further limits the exercise of personal jurisdiction over out-of-state defendants in Christy Rios et al., v. Bayer Corporation et al., and Nichole Hamby et al., v. Bayer Corporation et al., 2020 IL 125020. At issue was whether “Illinois may exercise specific personal jurisdiction over an out-of-state defendant as to the claims of out-of-state plaintiffs for personal injuries suffered outside of Illinois from a device manufactured outside of Illinois.” Following rulings from the United States Supreme Court and those from other states, the court answered with a resounding: “no.”

Courtroom

On January 3, 2020, in Mary Ellerbrock, Individually, and as Special Administrator of the Estate of Alex Kaszynski, Deceased, v. A.O. Smith Corp., et. al. (case No. 18-L-1434), the Third Judicial Circuit Court in Madison County, IL, denied defendant PW Power Systems’ (“PW”) motion to transfer based on forum non conveniens. In this asbestos case, premises Defendant PW sought to have the case moved from Madison County, IL to LaSalle County, IL. In denying PW’s motion, the Court referenced the Supreme Court’s decision in Fennell v. Illinois Central R.R. Co., emphasizing “[t]he defendant must show that the plaintiff’s chosen forum is inconvenient to the defendant and that another forum is more convenient to all parties.” 2012 IL 113812, ¶ 6. The Court’s reliance on Fennell for support that all defendants must join the motion is misplaced given that Fennell involved only one defendant.

On December 19, 2019, the First District issued its opinion in Daniels v. Arvinmeritor, Inc., affirming a $6 million verdict for the estate of Patrick O’Reilly, a union pipefitter from 1957 to 1998 who passed away from mesothelioma in April of 2017. 2019 IL App (1st) 190170 (formerly Daniels v. John Crane, Inc.). John Crane was the only defendant left when the jury verdict was reached, subjecting it to a nearly $5 million liability after set-offs were subtracted. After its motion for a new trial was denied, John Crane appealed arguing the trial erred in denying its post-trial motion because the  court: (1) allowed Plaintiff’s medical expert, Dr. Abraham, to testify that the cumulative dose of Plaintiff’s exposure to all products caused his injury; (2) provided inaccurate jury instructions regarding proximate cause and the state of the art defense in asbestos cases; (3) failed to include four settled defendants on the jury form; and (4) did not properly analyze certain settlement agreements prior to making good faith findings. The appellate court ultimately affirmed the judgment of the circuit court. Below is a brief analysis on each of the issues on appeal.

Recently, a Missouri Court of Appeals vacated a trial court’s award of $110 million in an ovarian cancer talc case, Slemp v. Johnson & Johnson, ED 106190 (Mo. Ct. App. Oct. 15, 2019). This is the third talc verdict handed down by a St. Louis jury overturned on appeal based on lack of personal jurisdiction in light of the United States Supreme Court’s ruling in Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. v. Superior Court of California, San Francisco County, 137 S. Ct. 1773, 198 L. Ed. 2d 395 (2017) (“BMS”).