Huskey v. Ethicon Begins Friday

Dogs from JH Facebook page

Jo Huskey (JH), 54, was implanted with a TVT-O, a vaginal sling made of Prolene mesh, on February 23, 2011.

She experienced mesh erosion and dyspareunia (painful sex). As a result of her pelvic mesh complications, she had a revision surgery November 18, 2011. Only part of the medical device could be removed so her stress urinary incontinence returned as well as constant pelvic and vaginal pain.

Jury selection in her product liability trial is set to begin Friday, August 22 with the trial commencing in a federal court in West Virginia August 25.

The case number is 2:12-cv-05201.

Law firms Wexler Wallace and Motley Rice represent Ms. Huskey. It appears Christy Jones (Butler Snow) and Dave Thomas will represent Ethicon (Johnson & Johnson), as they did in the last Ethicon case tried in this court.

The complaint was filed September 6, 2012 in MDL # 2327. See Huskey Doc #1 Short Complaint form. If the JH case settles, the case of Tonya Edwards will take its place 2:12-cv-09972.

TVT and TVT-O, surology.com

TVT-O

The TVT-O (transvaginal tape obturator) is a polypropylene mesh hammock, sling or tape, designed to support the urethra and correct stress urinary incontinence (SUI). Like the TVT (transvaginal tape), TVT-O is implanted through the vagina, but unlike the TVT which exits through the lower abdomen, the TVT-O has an exit point through the groin, making mesh injuries and mesh removal potentially harmful and injurious. Both types of mesh hammocks are still on the market.

The TVT-O is made by the Ethicon division of Johnson & Johnson (J&J) and it is the same medical device that was found by a Dallas jury to be defectively design in the Linda Batiste trial last April here.

St. Louis mesh removal surgeon, Dr Dionysios Veronikis also believes TVT-O is defective in that that area is very sensitive and fraught with problems when it needs to be removed. See here.

U.S. District Court, Charleston, WV

Federal Court in West Virginia

The Huskey case is just one of 66,379 cases filed in this courtroom with Ethicon leading the pack with 21,570 cases.

In January 2012, a judicial panel decided to make Charleston, WV the courthouse where pelvic mesh cases from around the country would be consolidates. Every month at least 2,000 are added to the docket. Twenty-thousand cases have been added to this federal court just since January. All of the pelvic mesh cases are product liability, also known as defective product cases. They are being overseen by Judge Joseph Goodwin.

Ethicon Trials so Far

Plaintiff Lewis

No doubt Ethicon hopes this trial will echo the case of Carolyn Lewis that ended abruptly in this same court last February with a directed verdict for Ethicon. See case background here.

The Dallas trial of Linda Batiste concluded in April with a $1.1 million jury award. The jury concluded that the TVT-O she had implanted was a defectively designed device.

Three cases naming Ethicon quietly settled in Missouri earlier this year while the plaintiff no doubt is hopeful the outcome of the Huskey case will more closely resemble the Linda Gross trial in New Jersey last February which ended in an 11.1 million verdict for Mrs. Gross.

That award is being appealed. #