Bard’s New Trial Request Rejected Over $3.6 million Verdict

Bard’s New Trial Request Rejected Over $3.6 million Verdict

Introduction

An Arizona federal judge rejected C.R.Bard's appeal for a new trial and judgment in a $3.6 million verdict awarded to a woman, who suffered complications due to fracture and migration of the G2 IVC filter.

The plaintiff was implanted with the IVC filter in 2007, which gradually broke, tilted and migrated, causing injuries to her inferior vena cava. She filed a lawsuit against the manufacturer for being negligent in providing adequate warning about the faulty device to her doctors. The U.S. District Court, District of Arizona found C.R. Bard liable for the woman's complications. The plaintiff was awarded $1.6 million in actual damages and $2 million in punitive damages in March. The company stated that the plaintiff had “utterly failed to present any evidence at the trial on the fundamental premise” of negligent failure to warn.

Bard called the jury's verdict “irreconcilably inconsistent" and filed motions for a new trial and a judgment as a matter of law on April 23rd. On June 19, 2018, Judge David Campbell rejected both arguments by Bard, and stated: “the focus in negligence is on the manufacturer’s conduct, while in strict liability it is on the product and the user’s expectations.”

More than 4,000 IVC filter product liability lawsuits are federally-filed against C.R.Bard over claims including filter migration and organ perforation. Judge David G. Campbell overlooks the multidistrict litigation (MDL No. 2641;  In Re: Bard IVC Filters Products Liability Litigation) formed on August 17, 2015, in the District of Arizona.