Missouri Injury Attorney Blog

A Texas appellate court Thursday overturned a $26 million Angleton jury finding a 59-year-old triathlete died because of his use of the painkiller Vioxx. The Missouri injury law firm of Cardin & Payne represents many Vioxx victims in the on-going Vioxx settlement.

The 14th Texas Court of Appeals ruled that the man's widow, Carol Ernst, should receive nothing because the more than one month of testimony in the nation's first Vioxx trial lacked sufficient evidence to prove the drug caused his heart problem and death. The jury of Texas citizens of course found that the drug did cause the death and that Merck WAS responsible.

This ruling on the 2005 trial came the same day a New Jersey court struck down most of a 2006 jury verdict against Vioxx maker Merck & Co. and earlier this month, an appellate court in San Antonio overturned a $32 million jury award to a widow in South Texas who claimed her husband died of a heart attack because of Vioxx.

Bruce Kuhlik, attorney for Merck said, "We are gratified that the Texas appeals court correctly found that Vioxx did not cause Mr. Ernst's death and reversed the previous decision for the plaintiff in the first Vioxx case to go to trial."

VIOXX taken off market

Vioxx was withdrawn from the U.S. market in 2004 when studies showed Vioxx was responsible for increasing the rate of heart attacks among patients and Merck has agreed to pay more than $4.8 billion to settle lawsuits by thousands of victims who point the cause of their heart attacks and strokes to be Vioxx.

Merck went to trial on several cases and has appealed those it lost.

Jon Skidmore, a Dallas-based Fulbright & Jaworksi attorney who helped try the Angleton case for Merck, said the rulings should not alter the global settlement. "The court found certain expert testimony by Mrs. Ernst's experts was possibility, speculation and surmise." However, the JURY didn't think this way. Houston appellate court Chief Justice Adele Hedges wrote that studies support the conclusion that "Vioxx use at a certain dose and duration is associated with risk of thrombotic cardiac event."

There is sure to be much more news on Vioxx and the courts that have a say in the outcomes so say tuned to the Missouri Injury Attorney Blog.