S.D. Alabama Tosses SJS Case In opposition to Defendant that didn’t Make or Promote the Product

In 1972, Neil Younger wrote his nice tune, “Alabama,” the lyrics of which included the next: “Alabama, you’ve obtained the remainder of the union, that can assist you alongside; what’s going fallacious?”  These lyrics occurred to us in 2013, after we learn the Weeks determination, wherein the Alabama Supreme Court docket endorsed innovator legal responsibility. We get how loopy California would embrace such nonsense, however how might Alabama, dwelling of Huntsville rocket scientists and inspiration for To Kill a Mockingbird, arrive at such an error? We known as the Weeks determination “execrable” after we wrote about it right here.  Two years later, we have been buzzing alongside to a higher tune, Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Candy Dwelling Alabama,” when the Alabama legislature abolished the innovator legal responsibility doctrine in that nice state.  (We mentioned that solonic reversal right here.)

At the moment’s case, Watkins v. Pfizer, Inc., 2023 WL 7308325 (S.D. Alabama Nov. 6, 2023), furnishes recent proof that the product legal responsibility aspect of product identification is alive and properly in Alabama, due to the legislature’s restoration of sanity. Watkins entails a very fashionable over-the-counter (OTC) medication.  The professional se plaintiff sued a few producers, alleging that the OTC ache reliever prompted him to undergo from Stevens Johnson Syndrome (SJS).  When you’ve learn this weblog for any size of time, that whereas SJS is a really uncommon illness, it’s not so uncommon within the space of OTC litigation.  SJS generally is a horrible illness, and SJS plaintiffs might be terribly sympathetic.  Even so, there are authorized and medical defenses in SJS circumstances.  

In Watkins, one of many defendants supplied up the protection that it was not a producer, designer, or vendor of the product.  It filed a movement to dismiss the case beneath Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6).  The damage occurred in Alabama.  Due to this fact, Alabama substantive legislation ruled the case.  Quoting the identical 2015 statutory modification that the Weblog mentioned (Ala. Code part 6-5-530(a) says that “Designers, producers, sellers, or lessors of merchandise not recognized as having been used, ingested, or encountered by an allegedly injured social gathering might not be held accountable for any alleged damage”), the Watkins determination threw out the criticism as a result of, irrespective of how liberally the professional se plaintiff’s criticism was construed —  which, within the Eleventh Circuit might be fairly liberal certainly – it didn’t embrace the statutorily mandated aspect of figuring out a product made/bought by the defendant. The court docket took judicial discover of publicly out there supplies, together with the defendant’s annual report, that demonstrated who makes what. The plaintiff didn’t problem the knowledge exhibiting that the movant didn’t make or promote the medication. Accordingly, the court docket dismissed the entire plaintiff’s claims towards the shifting defendant as a result of the plaintiff “did not state a believable declare for reduction beneath Alabama legislation towards” the shifting defendant. 

As considered one of our esteemed defense-side colleagues (who performed for and gained a nationwide championship beneath Bear Bryant) would say, Roll Tide.