Here's a sample of the 167 questions (on a 25 page questionnaire) that potential jurors were asked as part of the selection process:
Have you or someone close to you ever suffered a serious side effect while taking a prescription drug?
Before taking any type of prescription drug, do you read the patient information sheet?
Do you believe Vioxx causes or contributes to heart attacks in everyone who takes it, some people who take it, only a few people who take it, or no one who takes it?
What is your opinion of the Food and Drug Administration?
If the FDA approved a prescription drug, would you consider it safe no matter what the evidence in the case?
In the past few years, has your confidence in the FDA's ability to ensure the safety of prescription drugs increased, decreased, or stayed the same?
Do you worry a lot about the safety of prescription drugs?
If the FDA has approved a prescription drug and then someone dies or is injured by that drug, who is responsible?
Superior Court Judge Carol Higbee (pic) is overseeing a Vioxx docket of more than 5,000 cases in New Jersey. She has made it plain she wants to start moving cases along faster. Besides consolidating two cases into one this time, she is using a chess clock to regulate how much time attorneys can spend on their case. The plaintiffs will get 40 hours, while the defense will get 35.
Insiders' view: This, in lawyer terms, is the "main event". Hotshot plaintiff lawyer Mark Lanier vs Christy Jones, the only holdover from Merck's successful defense of the Vioxx case brought by Frederick Humeston in Atlantic City last fall. Courtly and competent, Jones has a long record of success defending companies in product-liability cases.
But Lanier is good, and a winner down in Texas!
NJ.com
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