Goodwin
CHARLESTON – Judges from four states will gather in Charleston to help U.S. District Judge Joseph Goodwin evaluate experts in litigation over heart medicine Digitek.
Goodwin announced on Dec. 21 that he and judges from West Virginia, New Jersey, Texas and Pennsylvania will conduct a hearing in his court on Oct. 13 and 14.
"The court recognizes that each state may have its own standards and procedures for expert testimony designed to ensure the reliability and relevance of evidence based upon scientific, technical and other specialized knowledge," he wrote.
Goodwin presides over hundreds of Digitek suits by appointment of the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multi District Litigation.
Plaintiffs claim Actavis Totowa and Mylan Pharmaceuticals made and sold Digitek pills that injured consumers.
While the federal panel has sent hundreds of cases to Goodwin, hundreds of other cases remain pending in state courts.
In West Virginia, the Supreme Court of Appeals has consolidated Digitek cases from state courts and assigned them to the court's mass litigation panel.
Circuit Judge Alan Moats of Grafton, chair of the state's mass litigation panel, will join Goodwin at the hearing in October.
So will judges Sandra Mazer Moss of Pennsylvania, Brian Martinotti of Pennsylvania, and Buddie Hahn of Texas.
They will address scientific and technical issues pursuant to a 1993 decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, Goodwin wrote.