Once again, Roche is trying to remove a New Jersey judge from the sprawling Accutane litigation. After being rebuffed earlier this year when Superior Court Judge Carol Higbee refused to recuse herself, the drugmaker is now planning to ask the state Supreme Court to review its concerns. The move comes after a state appeals court declined to review the matter.
The drugmaker, which is defending more than 7,700 lawsuits charging the risks associated with the acne medication were not properly disclosed, had asked Higbee to recuse herself over an alleged pattern of comments and decisions in which she has "unjustifiably prejudged Roche as a corporate defendant that is underhanded and not credible," according to our earlier report...
As we noted, the dispute brought into the open longstanding frustration defense attorneys have had with the state court system in New Jersey, where countless lawsuits have been filed against drugmakers. The Superior Court of Atlantic County, where Higbee works, was dubbed No. 4 in the annual ranking of judicial hellholes - or unfair jurisdictions - as compiled by the American Tort Reform Association in 2008. This occurred in the midst of the litigation over the Vioxx painkiller over which Higbee presided.
Read More
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
No Retreat for Roche
New Jersey Law Journal
August 2, 2013
Lawyers for Accutane maker Hoffmann-La Roche aren't backing off their efforts to have a new judge assigned to the mass litigation over the acne drug.
On Thursday, they notified the state Supreme Court clerk that they will seek review of the denial of their motion for recusal of Atlantic County Superior Court Judge Carol Higbee, whose rulings and demeanor, they claim, have repeatedly demonstrated partiality toward the plaintiffs.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By Ben Horowitz | The Star-Ledger
August 5, 2013
After 21 years, four judges and allegations of both chicanery and evil, one of New Jersey's longest-running civil lawsuits is finally nearing conclusion as a judge summarized her findings in the case today.
Her decision followed a two-year trial that clogged a courtroom with boxes piled high with paper and may have set records for lawyers' and accountants' fees in a single case.
