Levaquin Lawsuit Filed Against Ortho-McNeil

By November 9, 2011July 10th, 2019Uncategorized

A new Levaquin lawsuit has been filed. While this is not significant in and of itself as it is one of scores of similar suits, one thing does stand out about this case: Johnson & Johnson will not be the defendant. Instead, the plaintiff has listed Ortho-McNeil as the defendant.

Most of the time, J&J is named in Levaquin lawsuits. But this time, it is the company’s subsidiary that will be in the hot seat. Ortho-McNeil-Janssen is a subsidiary of J&J, and (what most people don’t know) is the actual manufacturer of the controversial antibiotic Levaquin. Legally, this means that Ortho can be held just as liable in Levaquin lawsuits as J&J. In fact, when you go to the actual Levaquin website, it is not the J&J logo that you see, but the Janssen logo. The reason for this is because Levaquin is a product of Janssen Pharmaceuticals.

This is significant because Janssen is also the company that had to pay plaintiff John Schedin $1.7 million in damages when he won his lawsuit back in December of last year. Schedin’s case was the first Levaquin case to go to trial and win a settlement. Two other cases have been tried but the defendants (J&J) won the verdicts in those cases.

In this most recent case, Arthur and Patricia Ilardi had originally filed a lawsuit back in December of last year in the Supreme Court of New York. The case is built around the suffering of Mr. IIardi, who says he has serious and permanent injuries after taking Levaquin for only a couple of weeks. His wife claims that because of her husband’s injuries, she “suffered a loss of services, companionship, society and consortium.”

Originally, the Ilardis’ lawsuit also named his doctor as a defendant, but on September 14, the couple decided to remove their action against Mai Liu, M.D. and Nassau-Queens Pulmonary Associates. This new tactic in naming Ortho-McNeil as a defendant should prove interesting, and this case is definitely one to watch as it may give future plaintiffs a new way to win their Levaquin lawsuits.