Twelve years into sprawling litigation over its blockbuster acne drug Accutane, Hoffmann-La Roche Inc. convinced a New Jersey judge on Friday that plaintiffs had “cherry-picked” scientific research to suggest that Accutane use can cause Crohn's Disease. The decision could help Roche's lawyers, led by Covington & Burling, put a quick end to thousands of pending lawsuits over the drug.

Superior Court Judge Nelson Johnson in New Jersey's Atlantic County agreed to exclude testimony from the plaintiffs' expert witnesses in the consolidated Accutane litigation, which alleges that Roche failed to provide enough warning about the acne drug's potential connection to forms of irritable bowel disease.

Johnson held that the plaintiffs' expert analysis suffered from “multiple deficiencies,” such as overlooking a number of scientific studies that cast serious doubt on possible links between Accutane and Crohn's Disease.