Jury Awards $20 Million Verdict to Victim of Defective Metal on Metal Hip Replacement
A St. Louis jury sent a $20 million dollar message to Biomet Orthopedics in Federal Court today. The verdict sided clearly in favor of Mary Bayes, who suffered extensive heavy metal poisoning and 6 traumatic hip revision surgeries because of the metal-on-metal hip replacement. The trial relied upon testimony and evidence uncovered by the metal-on-metal hip team at mctlaw.
The legal team at mctlaw spent years investigating metallosis and heavy metal poisoning caused by metal on metal hip replacements. From secret files of hip replacement manufacturers, they were able to determine what the manufacturers knew and when they knew it. This process took years and was accomplished by painstaking document review, continual court battles, and verbal examinations of evasive company employees. Our attorneys have personally questioned under oath dozens of marketing executives, testing engineers, and the CEO’s of some of the largest medical corporations in the world.
“The horrific injuries suffered by Mrs. Bayes are what we have been warning about for years,” says mctlaw attorney Ilyas Sayeg, who attended the St. Louis trial. “People with metal on metal hip replacements are still going about their lives unaware that they have ticking time bombs in their hips.”
Despite severe injuries and even deaths from heavy metal poisoning caused by metal-on-metal hip replacements, the United States Food and Drug Administration continues to stand by and do nothing. While manufacturers stopped selling metal-on-metal hip replacements in the United States, they have never been required to recall or warn patients of the dangers posed by the hip replacements. In fact, tens of thousands of patients in the United States have metal-on-metal hip replacements implanted in their bodies but don’t even realize it. They believe that if there was a problem with their hip replacement, the FDA would let them know. Unfortunately, that has not happened.
Today’s compelling $20 million dollar verdict shows that juries understand that orthopedic corporations have put profits before the safety of their patients for a very long time. Victims like Mary Bayes are left with a hefty verdict, but she is still horrifically injured and will never recover from what the metal on metal implants did to her body, her health, and her life. But this verdict is not the end of the trial. The next phase will award punitive damages in this case. Punitive damages are considered a financial punishment against the defendant when their actions are found to be in flagrant disregard for the safety of others.
Mctlaw is a national law firm with offices in Sarasota, Florida; Washington, DC; and Seattle, Washington. After filing the first metal-on-metal hip replacement case in 2008, mctlaw has gone on to represent metal hip patients in courts across the country.
