New Jersey Accutane Lawsuits Consolidated Into Mass Tort

Lawsuits over Accutane inflammatory bowel disease have been filed by hundreds of individuals from across the United States. The complaints include allegations that the drug makers failed to properly test and research Accutane intestinal problems and failed to adequately warn about the risk of inflammatory bowel disease, also referrd to as IBD,  on Accutane. Millions of dollars in compensatory damages have been awarded by juries for individuals who have experienced Accutane IBD, and attorneys are continuing to review new claims for Accutane lawsuits by individuals who have been diagnosed with problems. Recently, many of these cases were consolidated in New Jersey into a mass tort action. A mass tort is a civil action involving

numerous plaintiffs against one or a few corporate defendants in state or federal court. As the name implies a mass tort includes many plaintiffs and law firms have used the mass media to reach possible plaintiffs.
As of October 2010, Roche has lost all Accutane bowel disease suits that have gone to trial, resulting in jury awards totaling more than $50 million in Accutane lawsuit settlements. A class action lawsuit, as opposed to a mass tort action, is a complaint filed by one party on behalf of everyone in a similar situation. Such lawsuits look at the big picture and are useful, for example, to force a company to take a legal action.

Although Accutane suits against Roche go back as far as 2003, a number of cases have been filed recently following rulings by the state’s high court which affirmed that the Accutane statute of limitations in each case should be based on when plaintiffs discovered there could be a connection between the drug and their bowel disorder. Roche had argued that the statute of limitations should be based on when they placed IBD warnings on the drug’s label. However, many former users never learned about the connection between their bowel problems and Accutane until recent news coverage of Accutane trials and television advertisements by Accutane lawyers. Roche has lost all six Accutane bowel disease trials that have reached a jury so far, with many resulting in multi-million dollar awards.