Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH headquarters in Germany. Photo: Krisztian Bocsi/Bloomberg

A Hartford Superior Court jury found Ridgefield, Connecticut-based Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals Inc. breached its duty to provide adequate warnings and instructions for the appropriate use of blood thinner Pradaxa, and awarded a New York man $542,465 plus punitive damages.

The six-person jury found in favor of 81-year-old plaintiff Eugene Roberto, whose attorneys said suffered life-threatening bleeding two and a half years after he began taking the drug.

Judge Carl Schuman will rule soon on punitive damages and can allow for $1,084,930, or double what the jury awarded in compensatory damages.

The verdict in the Roberto case marks the latest of at least four recent rulings over the alleged dangers of Pradaxa litigated in Connecticut, where plaintiff counsel estimate that about 3,000 cases are pending in Hartford Superior Court's complex litigation division.

In three of these cases, juries found the Connecticut pharmaceutical company's German-based parent Boehringer Ingelheim either liable for failure to warn or failure to test, but not causation. But only one jury—the one in the Roberto case—awarded damages. In one other case, the company was completely exonerated.

Roberto's attorney, Neal Moskow, told the Connecticut Law Tribune Tuesday that “treating physicians and the experts confirmed it was a life-threatening bleed.”

“He had six units of blood transfused in the hospital, and he was in the ICU for four days,” said Moskow, co-founder and managing member of Fairfield-based Ury & Moskow.

The attorney said Roberto, who has gastroesophageal reflux disease, or GERD, switched from the popular blood thinner Warfarin to Pradaxa, but is now on Eliquis, a drug from a competing pharmaceutical company.

In total, there were 18 witnesses at trial and more than 100 documents admitted, Moskow said.

Moskow said his expert, New York City-based gastroenterologist Stuart Finkel, made the connection.

“In this particular case, Finkel said Pradaxa caused the bleed,” Moskow said.

After the jury returned its verdict, the judge asked jurors to engage in a panel-like discussion with the court and the parties, Moskow said.

“The jurors said the evidence showed that Pradaxa is a good drug for most people, but for a patient with risk factors for bleeding like Mr. Roberto, the only way to know if it's a good drug for him is to test his Pradaxa blood levels, and the company did not warn his doctor about that,” Moskow said. “That, right there, was our case.”

Moskow said Roberto “cried after the verdict was read” and said his client “believes very strongly that there are other people out there that may be saved because he filed a lawsuit and went to trial.”

Representing Boehringer Ingelheim are Paul Schmidt in Covington & Burling's Washington, D.C., office, and Sharla Frost with Tucker Ellis in Houston. Schmidt and Frost referred all comment to Boehringer Ingelheim's media relations department. On Tuesday, the company emailed a statement.

“Boehringer Ingelheim is committed to patient safety and improving patients' lives, and so we are disappointed that the jury in this case reached a different result from the juries in the three prior cases in this same court,” it said. “BI will pursue all avenues of appeal.”

Throughout the trials, Boehringer Ingelheim has argued it is protected from liability under federal law because the Food and Drug Administration has approved the Pradaxa label.

Moskow expects the defense to challenge the award.

“They are asking to have the court rule there was insufficient evidence to take to the jury and to take the verdict away,” he said.

Assisting Moskow were Andy Childers and Emily Acosta of Atlanta-based Childers, Schleuter & Smith; and Yvette Ferrer of Atlanta-based Ferrer, Poirot and Wansborough.

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$1.25M Verdict Returned Against Boehringer Ingelheim Over Pradaxa Blood Thinner