Tara D. Sutton Appointed to Plaintiff’s Law and Motions Committee in DePuy ASR MDL

U.S. District Court Judge David A. Katz appointed partner Tara D. Sutton to the Plaintiffs' Law and Motions Committee in the DePuy ASR Multi-District Litigation

March 9, 2011; Updated April 2013

On January 26, 2011, U.S. District Court Judge David A. Katz appointed partner Tara D. Sutton to the Plaintiffs' Law and Motions Committee in the DePuy ASR Multi-District Litigation. On August 26, 2010, DePuy Orthopaedics announced that it was recalling two hip replacement products: the ASR XL Acetabular System and the ASR Hip Resurfacing System. Patients who had the DePuy ASR hip prostheses implanted in their bodies are experiencing premature failure of the hip implants, resulting in pain, recovery time and expense required by a revision surgery. Some patients have also been found to have toxic levels of metal in their blood. All lawsuits filed in federal court involving claims of injury from the DePuy ASR hip implants have been consolidated before Judge Katz in the Northern District of Ohio. In re DePuy Orthopaedics, Inc., ASR Hip Implant Products Liability Litigation, MDL No. 2197 (N.D. Ohio). DePuy ASR hip implants were widely implanted in tens of thousands of patients across the country. DePuy Orthopaedics is a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson.

Ms. Sutton is Chair of the Mass Tort Litigation department and her practice focuses on representing individuals injured or killed as a result of defective drugs and medical devices. She was Lead Counsel in the Mirapex Multi-District Litigation and tried the first Mirapex case in the nation, resulting in a plaintiff's verdict of $8,279,300, which included $7.8 million in punitive damages, for failing to warn of the risk of compulsive behaviors, including pathological gambling, caused by the drug Mirapex. Charbonneau v. Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals, Inc. and Pfizer, Inc., 06-CV-1215 (D. Minn. July 30, 2008). After this verdict, more than 280 Mirapex cases represented by Robins, Kaplan, Miller & Ciresi L.L.P. were settled on a confidential basis. Ms. Sutton was also a member of the Science and Discovery Committees in the Vioxx Multi-District Litigation and she was trial counsel in the historic Minnesota Tobacco Litigation.