Punitive Damages Overkill: J&J Hit With Still Another Disproportionate Punitive Award In Pelvic-Mesh Litigation

As early as 1967, Judge Friendly worried about the phenomenon of punitive damages overkill in mass tort litigation. Fifty years later, the problem persists.

Last week, a Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, jury awarded a plaintiff $2.5 million in compensatory damages and $17.5 million in punitive damages—seven times the compensatory damages—in the latest of a large series of cases alleging that Johnson & Johnson subsidiary Ethicon had failed to warn about the risks of its pelvic-mesh device. In previous cases, juries had imposed punitive awards of $5 million, $7 million, and $10 million.

In each prior case, the trial court has refused to reduce the award of punitive damages. From all appearances, blinded by J&J's substantial net worth, the courts in these cases have given no serious consideration to the prospect that either individually or in the aggregate the punitive damages are excessive.  Nor have they given any weight to the fact that J&J has been exonerated in