Quoted from http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-01-24/roche-settles-raptiva-claims-plaintiffs-lawyer-says.html
Roche Settles Raptiva Claims, Plaintiffs’ Lawyer Says
January 24, 2012, 10:03 AM EST
By Laurence Viele Davidson and Jef Feeley
Jan. 24 (Bloomberg) -- Roche Holdings AG settled lawsuits claiming its Raptiva psoriasis drug caused infections, according to a lawyer for the plaintiffs.
The lawyer, Mark Lanier, wouldn’t disclose the terms of the settlement today. Genentech withdrew the medication from the market almost three years ago.
Genentech, a unit of Basel, Switzerland-based drugmaker Roche, was sued in state court in California over allegations that Raptiva caused Stephen Johnson’s death. The 46-year-old Louisiana businessman took the drug to treat a skin condition. That trial had been set to begin this month and was postponed last week to June, according to the case docket.
The Johnson family was seeking $15 million in compensatory damages along with “several hundred million dollars” in punitive damages, according to plaintiffs’ lawyers.
Nadine O’Campo, a spokeswoman for South San Francisco, California-based Genentech, couldn’t be reached immediately before regular business hours to comment on any settlement.
Genentech began taking Raptiva off the U.S. and European markets in April 2009 after three psoriasis patients were diagnosed with progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy, or PML, a rare, incurable brain infection. The month before the withdrawal, Roche completed a $46.8 billion buyout of the biotech company.
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