Manhattan federal judge declares first of nearly 1,500 plaintiffs lawsuits against Fosamax manufacturer a mistrial. Reports of violence and dessention in the U.S. District court jury deliberation room leads to New York federal judge declaring mistrial.
New York product liability lawyers news-Southern District of New York Judge declares Fosamax lawsuit a mistrial.
New York, NY–New York product injury lawyers were sent home on Friday, September 11, 2009, after a Manhattan federal judge declared a mistrial in the first of almost 1,500 Fosamax injury lawsuits. Judge John F. Keenan, in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in Manhattan, declared the case of plaintiff Shirley Boles, Fosamax Products Liability Litigation, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan), No. 06-1789, a mistrial. According to reports from Reuters and AT&T News, product liability lawyers began the first Fosamax injury trial about a month ago claiming Merck & Company’s former number one osteoporosis medication, Fosamax, causes painful jaw bone destruction.
The jurors who have sat on the month-long trial in Manhattan were informing the judge since Monday they were dead locked and unable to reach a verdict. Judge John F. Keenan declared a mistrial after only one hour of deliberations on Friday and according to reports the jury had spent about 20 total hours deliberating the verdict over 5 days. The first plaintiff’s case in a list of over a thousand claiming Fosamax caused painful bone destruction started off with a bang in the court and seemed to explode in the jury room. Reports of the New York City federal judge receiving notes from the one hold out juror claiming a fellow juror threatened to “beat me up” and another juror threw a chair brought pushed the justice to give the jury the day off on Thursday in hopes of cooling down the deliberations so a decision could be made.
No such luck for victim, Boles, in the product liability case. Shirley Boles a 71 year-old Fort Walton, Florida woman asserts in September 2003 she began developing severe jaw bone destruction and dental problems. She has suffered repeated infections draining through her chin, loss of bone tissue, and inability to eat solid foods. Boles product liability attorneys aggressively advocated her claims in court and further argued these horrific symptoms and permanent destruction began six years after the start of taking Fosamax. Merck had block buster sales with the bone preserving osteoporosis medication and earned $3.2 billion at its peak in 2005. The osteoporosis medication was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) http://www.fda.gov in 1995. Medication package inserts for a new form of Fosamax which combines Vitamin D in its formulary indicates the following warning, “may cause jawbone problems in some people. Jawbone problems may include infection, and delayed healing after teeth are pulled.” The 1,500 additional plaintiffs’ lawsuits indicate the same jaw bone destruction also known as osteonecrosis.
Heather L. Ryan, legal news reporter for New York drug injury lawyers.