Bloomberg News
Pfizer settles another Rezulin suit
Deal announced before verdict in Missouri case
By Bloomberg News, Special to the Daily Record
LIBERTY, Mo. -- Pfizer's Warner-Lambert Co. settled a lawsuit filed by a woman who said the company's Rezulin diabetes drug left her in need of a liver transplant. The settlement was announced as a jury was about to rule in the case.
Jurors in state court in Liberty, Mo., deliberated for about 15 hours and were preparing to deliver their verdict Thursday when lawyers said the suit had been settled with Shirley Griggs under confidential terms.
Rezulin, designed to help adult diabetics regulate their insulin, was pulled off the market last year after being blamed for at least 63 deaths tied to liver failure.
The company marketed Rezulin knowing it was ``unreasonably dangerous,'' Griggs' lawyer, Rainey Booth, told the jury earlier.
In a statement released after the settlement, Pfizer spokesman Robert J. Fauteux said trial evidence showed Griggs' liver was damaged by a pre-existing condition, not by Rezulin.
Just before the jurors were called into the courtroom to give their verdict, defense attorney Scott Sayler told the judge, ``We've reached a confidential and mutually satisfactory agreement'' and Griggs will be paid damages within about 30 days.
``It's over,'' said Griggs, 67, outside the courtroom.
``That's the best thing,'' said her 69-year-old husband, Jerry.
The agreement comes just six days after Pfizer agreed to pay $30 million to settle a Texas case filed by another Rezulin user who doctors say is dying of liver failure. A jury had ordered Pfizer to pay $43 million earlier that day and was weighing whether to award punitive damages when the settlement was announced. The initial award might have been overturned on appeal, Pfizer said at the time.
Shares of New York-based Pfizer, which reported $29.5 billion in fiscal 2000 sales, fell 27 cents to $40.35.
Based on insurance coverage and reserves, lawsuits over Rezulin ``should not have a material adverse effect on the financial position or results of the company,'' said Pfizer's general counsel, Paul S. Miller, in a statement. The case is among the first of more than 4,000 suits to go before a jury on allegations that Morris Plains-based Warner-Lambert officials hid or downplayed the health risks of Rezulin.
Lawyers for Griggs, a retired bank teller, had sought at least $1 million for costs associated with a liver transplant.
They argued that Griggs suffered irreversible liver damage in the seven months she took Rezulin.
Neither Booth nor Sayler would comment on how much money Griggs will get, saying the parties agreed not to reveal terms of the settlement.
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