J&J judge slashes $1bn verdict over Pinnacle hip implants

NEW YORK: Johnson & Johnson won a ruling cutting almost in half a $1.04 billion jury award to patients who accused the company of hiding defects in its Pinnacle artificial hips that had to be surgically removed.

A judge on Tuesday left undisturbed a jury’s finding that officials of J&J and its DePuy unit failed to properly warn doctors and patients about the artificial hips’ flaws, but found the panel’s punitive-damage awards to six patients were excessive and should be reduced, according to court filings.

“Constitutional considerations limit the amount a plaintiff may recover in punitive damages,” US District Judge Ed Kinkeade in Dallas said in the ruling.

The cut wipes out about $500 million in punishment damages against J&J and DePuy over the company’s mishandling of the hip implants, said Mark Lanier, a lawyer for the patients who sued.

J&J still faces almost 9,000 lawsuits accusing the company of illegally marketing the flawed metalon-metal hips. J&J stopped selling the devices in 2013 after the US Food and Drug Administration toughened artificial-hip regulations.