Children’s deaths at Louisiana hospital raise questions

The New York Times reports on its front page from New Orleans about four children who died at Children’s Hospital “of various causes between August 2008 and July 2009 during an outbreak of a flesh-eating fungal infection, mucormycosis, most likely spread by bed linens, towels or gowns, according to a medical journal.” The disclosure of the deaths this month “caused new pain for the families of the children and raised troubling questions about how the infections came about, why doctors did not connect the cases until more than 10 months after the first death, and what obligation the hospital had to inform parents – and the community – of the outbreak.” The questions “take on greater urgency, experts say, because deadly fungal infections, while still rare, appear to be on the rise nationwide,” and which “may be because of changes in the environment and a larger pool of vulnerable people with suppressed immune systems because patients are living longer with serious illnesses.”

We believe that obtaining legal satisfaction from those who harmed you shouldn’t require more hardship. That’s why we do everything we can to streamline the process, and we will file a lawsuit on your behalf if necessary. If you or a loved one has been affected by Medical Negligence, contact Chhabra & Gibbs today by going to www.cglawms.com or by calling this number: 601-948-8005.

Louisiana children’s hospital sued over fungal infection outbreak

The New Orleans Times-Picayune reports that five years “after five patients died with a deadly fungal infection they received from hospital linens, Children’s Hospital officials on Thursday began contacting the families to inform them their loved ones were affected by the outbreak.” Dr. John Heaton, medical director for the New Orleans pediatric hospital, “said during an organized press conference that the hospital did not act appropriately with respect to informing families of patients of the outbreak, which lasted from August 2008 to July 2009. ‘Regrettably, it’s become clear that, while we made an extraordinary effort to identify and contain this infection, we did not make an extraordinary effort to communicate with our families and disclose the nature of this illness,’ Heaton said. ‘It’s personally appalling to me that we find that some of the families are finding out that their child was involved in this outbreak by reading the newspaper.’”

We believe that obtaining legal satisfaction from those who harmed you shouldn’t require more hardship. That’s why we do everything we can to streamline the process, and we will file a lawsuit on your behalf if necessary. If you or a loved one has been affected by Medical Negligence, contact Chhabra & Gibbs today by going to www.cglawms.com or by calling this number: 601-948-8005.

Tech who falsified mammogram results found guilty

A former radiology technician from Georgia has been sentenced to jail for faking the mammogram results of more than 1,200 women. Fox News says:

"Rachael Rapraeger will spend six months in prison. She pleaded guilty to entering more than 1,200 mammograms as negative."

But The Telegraph reports 10 of those women actually had cancer, two of whom have since died. And doctors at Perry Hospital, where Rapraeger used to work, never even reviewed the mammograms. It's unclear why they wouldn't have looked at those mammograms.

One of those 10 women who actually did have cancer is Sharon Holmes. CNN says Holmes discovered she had breast cancer two months after Rapraeger falsified Holmes' mammogram results in 2009.

Holmes has now been in remission for three years and spoke directly to Rapraeger while on the stand, saying, "You could have made a different decision, and my family and I would not be living this nightmare."

WMAZ quotes Holmes, who says: "I'm not a name on a piece of paper; I'm a person. And I think she will remember me."

According to KAEF Rapraeger's attorney told the judge his client was overwhelmed at work and that she falsified the results to get caught up. He added that she wasn't supervised properly.

Although she initially pleaded not guilty, Rapraeger ended up taking a plea deal and pleaded guilty to 10 counts of reckless conduct and one count of computer forgery.

WMAZ says Judge Katherine Lumsden reprimanded Rapraeger when handing down the sentence.

"You played Russian roulette with the lives of essentially a thousand women in this community."
Rapraeger has been sentenced to 12 months probation for each one of the 10 sentences and up to six months in a state detention center when space is made available. She is also not allowed to work in the health care industry for the next 10 years.

We believe that obtaining legal satisfaction from those who harmed you shouldn’t require more hardship. That’s why we do everything we can to streamline the process, and we will file a lawsuit on your behalf if necessary. If you or a loved one has been affected by Medical Negligence, contact Chhabra & Gibbs today by going to www.cglawms.com or by calling this number: 601-948-8005.

Japan drug maker Takeda to fight $6 billion damages awarded by U.S. jury

Takeda Pharmaceutical Co Ltd said it would contest $6 billion in punitive damages imposed by a jury in the United States in a case that accused Japan's largest drug maker of concealing cancer risks associated with its Actos diabetes drug.

Eli Lilly and Co, Takeda's co-defendant in the case, was ordered to pay $3 billion in punitive damages by the jury in Louisiana on Monday. It also awarded $1.475 million in compensatory damages.

Legal experts said it was unlikely that such a large award would stand after challenges in court by both companies. Eli Lilly and Takeda have said they would dispute the verdict, which could include appeals to a higher court or filing motions asking the trial judge to set aside or reduce the verdict.

"Although there's no mathematical bright line" to determine how high is too high when it comes to punitive damage awards, federal appeals courts generally scrutinize the ratio of punitive to compensatory damages, preferring those that fall into the single-digit range, according to Professor Catherine Sharkey, a tort law expert at New York University School of Law.

Punitive damages are meant to discourage companies from bad conduct. Compensatory damages are meant to pay victims for their actual losses. With a ratio of more than 6,100 to 1 of punitive to compensatory damages, the Actos award could be highly vulnerable.

"It's definitely the case that the U.S. Supreme Court has signaled to lower courts that they should be restraining very large punitive awards," Sharkey added.

Lilly, which co-promoted Actos from 1999 to 2006, said in a press release it will be indemnified by Takeda for its losses and expenses around the litigation based on the terms of its agreement with Takeda.

Takeda's shares fell as much as 8.8 percent to an eight-month low in Tokyo trading on Tuesday after the verdict. The stock ended 5.2 percent lower at 4,572 yen.

Lilly shares fell 0.2 percent, or 12 cents per share, to $58.50 per share in New York Stock Exchange trading.

The massive award was met with "stunned silence" in the Lafayette, Louisiana, courtroom, plaintiffs' lawyer Mark Lanier said.

Lanier acknowledged it was not certain whether the damages award would be sustained.

"Nobody has gone out and bought a new home," Lanier said.  "This is a conservative judge and a conservative court and she's very 'balls and strikes.' We're not under any grand illusion."

The $9 billion in punitive damages awarded by the jury against Takeda and Eli Lilly exceed the $5 billion penalty that a jury in Alaska imposed on Exxon Mobil Corp for the Exxon Valdez oil spill in 1989.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2008 that the previous Exxon Valdez award had been "excessive." The company was ultimately ordered to pay $500 million. That and other rulings have been read as limiting punitive damages in federal cases.

Lanier said the jury deliberated for only an hour and 10 minutes to deliver its verdict finding liability on all 14 questions, and 45 minutes longer to come out with the multibillion-dollar punitive damages.

The allocation of liability for compensatory damages was 75 percent for Takeda and 25 percent for Lilly, according to Lilly.

Takeda said judgments were entered in Takeda's favor in all three previous Actos trials, while this was the first federal case to be tried in a consolidated multidistrict litigation comprising more than 2,900 lawsuits.

Last May, a U.S. judge had nullified a separate jury verdict for $6.5 million against Takeda after ruling that the plaintiffs failed to offer any reliable evidence that Actos had caused cancer.

Germany and France suspended use of the drug, a multibillion-dollar seller, in 2011 because of concerns about a possible link to cancer.

The case is In Re: Actos Products Liability Litigation Case U.S. District Court, Western District Louisiana, No. 6:11-md-2299.

We believe that obtaining legal satisfaction from those who harmed you shouldn’t require more hardship. That’s why we do everything we can to streamline the process, and we will file a lawsuit on your behalf if necessary. If you or a loved one has took Actos and later got bladder cancer, contact Chhabra & Gibbs today by going to www.cglawms.com or by calling this number: 601-948-8005.

Criminal charges urged in GM defect probe

The AP reports that the families of “those who died in General Motors cars with defective ignition switches want prosecutors to go after GM insiders responsible for letting the problems fester for more than a decade – and perhaps for covering them up. ‘The only way the public is going to be protected from this negligence by companies is if there will ultimately be prison sentences,’ said Leo Ruddy of Scranton, Pa., whose 21-year-old daughter Kelly was killed in 2010 when her Chevrolet Cobalt veered inexplicably off the highway and crashed.” Family members “attended hearings in Washington last week that stoked those sentiments,” as lawmakers “confronted GM CEO Mary Barra with what they said was evidence that, in 2006, a company employee intentionally tried to conceal the switch problem,” and the “head of the nation’s auto safety watchdog said GM withheld critical information that connected the failing switch to air bags that didn’t deploy in a crash.”

Reuters reports that Sen. Claire McCaskill said on Sunday that GM should make restitution to the families of victims and possibly face criminal charges if warranted. McCaskill said on ABC’s “This Week” that GM faces “a real moment of truth” in its internal probe of the malfunctions. When asked on the show about possible criminal charges against individual company officials, McCaskill said, “You know we had the Citizens United case where our Supreme Court said corporations are people ... but if in fact they are people, there needs to be some criminal accountability depending on what the facts of the investigation show. I know the Justice Department is taking a hard look at this.”

McCaskill said on ABC’s This Week , “You don’t need an investigation to understand that they had a defective switch and someone at GM in the engineering department changed that switch and didn’t change the part number. There is no reason to keep the same part number unless you’re trying to hide the fact that you’ve got a defective switch out there that in fact ended up killing a number of people on our highways.”

GM to compensate victims of defective vehicles.

TIME reports General Motors chief executive Mary Barra last week testified before Congress that “the company is considering compensating families” of the 13 people who died in accidents caused by faulty ignition switches in its Cobalt and other small-engine vehicles. For advice “on possible compensation,” GM “tapped attorney Kenneth Feinberg, who is known for helping distribute cash to 9/11 families and those affected by the Boston Marathon bombings.” Time faults the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which didn’t launch a formal investigation into the ignition switch issue in 2007, and GM, which decided “not to replace the switch in 2005 at a cost of about $1 per car.” GM has “apologized but has done little to address perceptions of company negligence or propose a solution so it doesn’t happen again, says University of Southern California marketing professor Ira Kalb.”

Owners of recalled GM vehicles in Maine continue driving as replacement parts are unavailable. The Portland (ME) Press Herald reports that Maine drivers with recalled GM vehicles are anxious or confused “because GM announced the recall in stages” since February 13. Pointing out that “GM has admitted to knowing about” the ignition-switch problem “for a decade,” the story says that Maine’s GM dealers have had to inform owners “to call back later because replacement parts for the faulty switches aren’t yet available.” In Maine alone, “there are 4,775 Cobalts registered ... including 148 in Portland.” According to the report’s portrayal of the average driver of a recalled GM vehicle, most GM owners are electing to continue using their vehicles, albeit cautiously.

GM delivers 200,000 documents to NHTSA. Reuters reports with continuing coverage of the General Motors’ recalls and the Federal investigations into the automaker. The article says that GM handed over 200,000 pages of documents to NHTSA on Thursday, in addition to giving answers on 65 percent of the safety agency’s 107 questions that NHTSA wants clarified, according to GM spokesperson Greg Martin. A statement from NHTSA does not mention when the agency might make those documents available to the public, but the statement confirmed, NHTSA would “take appropriate action based on the agency’s review.” The report also mentions that this past week, GM CEO Mary Barra was under fire from a House panel that accused GM’s corporate culture of misconduct in covering up any awareness of a defect.

CNN’s Money reports, the documents GM provided “are expected to shed light on the number of people who have been killed in accidents caused by problems with the defective ignition switch.” As for a timetable for when NHTSA might make the documents public, the article notes that the agency “said it will probably spend weeks going through the filings and removing any information that shouldn’t be made public, such personal information about any of the crash victims.”

Texas judge demands GM provide more information on recalled vehicles. Bloomberg News reports that at a Federal court hearing yesterday in Corpus Christi, Texas US District Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos directed GM “to provide more explanation for why she shouldn’t force it to tell drivers of 2.59 million recalled small cars to ‘park it’ until faulty ignition switches are fixed.” Reuters has similar coverage.

The New York Times reports that GM claims that the 2.6 million cars it recalled for faulty ignition switches “are safe as long as extra items are removed from the key ring,” but “some consumer advocates and lawmakers have urged G.M. to warn owners not to drive the cars until they are fixed, saying that they still pose a danger.” Mentioning Ramos’ having “refrained from ruling on an emergency motion,” the article goes on to pose and answer several questions about the GM recall, including answers to “When can I get my car fixed?” and “Is my car safe to drive until it’s repaired?”

GM dealers ready for “onslaught” of recall-vehicle returns. Bloomberg News reports that with GM having received such bad press in the past few weeks, “GM dealers are gearing up for an onslaught of owners returning to their stores next week to receive repairs on the 2.59 million cars the automaker has recalled for faulty ignition switches.” In both the headline and the report, Bloomberg News characterizes the GM dealers “as therapists to customers,” especially as customers call in “with worries about the flaw.”

We believe that obtaining legal satisfaction from those who harmed you shouldn’t require more hardship. That’s why we do everything we can to streamline the process, and we will file a lawsuit on your behalf if necessary. If you or a loved one has been affected by this recall, and you believe it caused an injury, contact Chhabra & Gibbs today by going to www.cglawms.com or by calling this number: 601-948-8005.

Senate panel hears testimony from General Motors CEO

After appearing before a House panel on Tuesday, General Motors CEO Mary Barra appeared before a Senate Commerce Committee subcommittee Wednesday to discuss GM’s handling of a faulty ignition switch in some of its vehicles which has been linked to the deaths of 13 people. Coverage of Barra’s Senate testimony is much lighter than that of her House testimony. Only two of the three networks covered it Wednesday evening and there is less print coverage this morning. Generally, the coverage portrays the Senate hearing as more harsh than the House hearing, with many reports noting that senators accused GM of covering up the defect and were skeptical of Barra’s claims that GM’s culture has changed from that of the “old GM.”

The CBS Evening News reported that senators accused GM “of covering up a defect that has killed at least 13 people.” CBS added that Barra faced “many questions,” including why “no one has been dismissed over the delayed recall.” CBS also noted that while Barra “says the recalled vehicles are still safe to drive as long as drivers use the key only,” on Friday, a Federal judge in Texas “will hear a request that all the recalled vehicles be parked immediately.”

NBC Nightly News reported that Barra “came under withering attack for the company’s failure to order a recall over a decade ago.” In addition, GM was “accused of criminal behavior by US senators, many of them former prosecutors.” NBC added that Barra “still could not answer basic questions about GM policies and a decade delay in ordering an ignition switch recall.” NBC added that a “smoking gun” may be an “internal GM document obtained by NBC News authorizing a redesign to the defective part of the ignition switch for new cars in 2006.” In addition, “a House investigation has turned up more internal GM documents that cited high costs as a reason for not ordering fixes way back in 2005.” According to NBC, the Justice Department “has launched its own criminal investigation” into the matter.

The New York Times reports that the tone of the Senate hearing was “much harsher” as “senators more aggressively questioned Ms. Barra’s contention that the cars are safe to drive and doubted her statement that the company had moved from a culture of cost-cutting to one of safety and a focus on the consumer.” Barra “frequently simply sat and listened as the senators scolded her and the company.” She “frequently drew the ire of the senators when she repeatedly did not answer questions, saying either that she did not know or noting that an internal investigation was underway.” The panel also heard testimony from acting NHTSA administrator David J. Friedman and the Transportation Department’s inspector general, Calvin L. Scovel III.

The Wall Street Journal reports that as Barra sought to distance GM from the “old GM,” she was met with harsh attacks from senators who were clearly skeptical about how different the current company is from the one that developed the faulty cars. The Journal notes that Sen. Richard Blumenthal told Barra that if she were serious about breaking with the “culture” of the old GM, she would agree to compensate those victims whose claims came before GM’s bankruptcy and warn owners of cars with potential faulty ignition switches that “they should not drive them until they are fixed – because they are unsafe.”

McClatchy reports that Barra “withstood a barrage of questions and accusations” from senators “demanding to know how the automaker could have failed to fix the ignition switch for more than a decade.” Some “voiced skepticism about Barra’s candor in denying that she knew about the problem until Jan. 31 and in promising that the new GM, the one bailed out by taxpayers in 2009, ‘will do what’s right.’”

Reuters also describes Barra as under attack during the hearing in which senators accused GM of “criminal” behavior and “a culture of cover-up.”

A separate story in the New York Times reports that for the families of people killed in accidents involving the recalled GM cars, what is “most upsetting” is “the fact that G.M. won’t tell them what they most want to know.” GM has “refused to disclose publicly the list of the confirmed victims,” and the “enduring mystery has left scores of grieving families playing a guessing game.” The families and their attorneys “are running up against a technological reality beyond G.M.’s narrow definition of victims: Because many of the cars and their so-called black boxes were damaged or destroyed, there may not be enough evidence left from the crashes to prove what happened.”

Customers suing for “park-it” order on GM cars

Bloomberg News reports that US District Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos will “consider forcing the company to adopt what the customers call a ‘fail-safe solution’ to prevent further accidents while the switches are replaced.” Bloomberg reports that the “park-it” order was submitted along with a class-action lawsuit seeking $10 billion from GM, claiming that the cars are “too dangerous to drive.”

We believe that obtaining legal satisfaction from those who harmed you shouldn’t require more hardship. That’s why we do everything we can to streamline the process, and we will file a lawsuit on your behalf if necessary. If you or a loved one has been affected by this recall, and you believe it caused an injury, contact Chhabra & Gibbs today by going to www.cglawms.com or by calling this number: 601-948-8005.

GM CEO testifies before Congress

General Motors CEO Mary Barra’s testimony before a House subcommittee on Tuesday led all three network news broadcasts Tuesday evening. The networks dedicated more than nine-and-a-half minutes of coverage to the story, and it is the subject of extensive print coverage this morning. Generally the coverage casts lawmakers as angry that Barra was unable to provide more specific answers about GM’s delayed response to the faulty ignition switch problem. Most reports also note GM’s decision to retain Kenneth Feinberg, which is almost universally portrayed as an indication that the company expects to face claims from the families of those injured or killed in the recalled vehicles.

ABC World News reported in its lead story that GM CEO Mary Barra was “in the hot seat” as she testified before Congress about crashes linked to faulty ignitions in GM vehicles. ABC reported that Barra “was pressed on why the company decided, for nearly a decade, that fixing the ignition was too expensive.” ABC noted that GM “has now recalled more than two point six million cars with faulty ignitions.”

NBC Nightly News reported in its lead story that the hearing “quickly got testy, because her company finds itself explaining faulty ignition switches, deadly accidents and a recall that’s at least a decade too late.” NBC added that Barra “faced an angry Congress and promised to do the right thing.”

The CBS Evening News reported in its lead story that soon after Barra was sworn, “Congresswoman Diana DeGette displayed a GM ignition switch and said it would have cost the company 57 cents to fix it.” CBS added that members of the panel “repeatedly referred to GM’s own documents saying in 2005, engineers decided fixing the problem was not an acceptable business case.” Barra “kept blaming the old GM for a culture centered around cost and lack of communication between departments,” but “the committee often expressed frustration Barra wasn’t able to give better answers.”

USA Today reports that Barra “battled” the subcommittee, which “wanted far more information about GM’s fatal ignition-switch foul-ups than she was able to provide.” Barra was “battered for speaking ‘gobbledygook,’ thumped for not firing an engineer who apparently concealed a change to the potentially deadly switches, and blasted because GM made an economic decision to keep the flawed component in production while knowing it didn’t meet GM standards.” She avoided “any obvious gaffes” and largely avoided “specific answers, saying an internal investigation is underway into why it took GM so long to address ignition-switch problems first detected in 2001 this year.”

Reuters reports that Barra called GM’s delayed response “unacceptable,” but failed to provide any explanation. Rep. Henry Waxman told Barra, “Because GM didn’t implement this simple fix when it learned about the problem, at least a dozen people have died in defective GM vehicles.” Reuters notes that Barra also announced that GM had retained as a consultant Kenneth Feinberg, who will consider possible responses to the families of those injured or killed in crashes involving the impacted cars.

The Washington Post reports that Barra “deflected a barrage of questions on Capitol Hill about the automaker’s failure to fix a deadly ignition-switch flaw, telling lawmakers that she was unaware of the decade-old problem until early this year.” While she “repeatedly apologized” for the defect, she also “repeatedly ducked lawmakers’ sometimes testy queries, saying she is awaiting the results of an internal investigation.” The Post also notes that the decision to retain Feinberg “suggests that GM expects to face additional claims on behalf of people killed or injured in the recalled vehicles.”

The New York Times reports that in announcing that the company had retained Feinberg, Barra said, “G.M. has civil and legal responsibilities. ... We are thinking through exactly what those responsibilities are.” The announcement marked “the first time that G.M. has acknowledged that is considering making such payments, and comes in the face of mounting pressure from lawmakers and consumer groups.”

We believe that obtaining legal satisfaction from those who harmed you shouldn’t require more hardship. That’s why we do everything we can to streamline the process, and we will file a lawsuit on your behalf if necessary. If you or a loved one has been affected by this recall, and you believe it caused an injury, contact Chhabra & Gibbs today by going to www.cglawms.com or by calling this number: 601-948-8005.