A New Jersey appeals court handed Hoffmann-La Roche a minor victory on Tuesday when it affirmed a trial judge's ruling that four plaintiffs in the Accutane litigation blew the statute of limitations in filing their product liability lawsuits.

A three-judge Appellate Division panel, in an unpublished ruling, said four plaintiffs—out of the more than 2,500 cases pending against the Swiss pharmaceutical giant in state court—failed to file their lawsuits on a timely basis.

The suits allege users of anti-acne medication Accutane suffered harmful side effects. The company continues to maintain that there has been no causal connection proved between the use of Accutane and the plaintiffs' alleged medical disorders.

“All four of the plaintiffs were diagnosed with their ailments more than two years prior to the filing of their complaints,” said Appellate Division Judges Clarkson Fisher Jr., Thomas Sumners and Scott Moynihan.

The ruling does not affect the other pending mass-tort cases, which are consolidated and designated as multicounty litigation in Atlantic County.

The cases were dismissed in 2014 by Atlantic County Superior Court Judge Nelson Johnson, who has been assigned as the presiding judge of the state's Accutane docket.

Hoffmann-La Roche's attorney, Paul Schmidt of the New York office of Covington & Burling, referred questions to a spokeswoman for the company, Amanda Fallon. Fallon said in a statement that the appeals court properly dismissed the cases based on the violations of the statute of limitations.

The plaintiffs' attorney, David Buchanan of Seeger Weiss in New York, did not return a call seeking comment.

The cases adjudicated Tuesday involve four plaintiffs—Kristy Brecke of Minnesota, Gregory Luongo of Massachusetts, James Boerman Jr. of Florida and Brian Zimpfer of Colorado—filed their lawsuits against Hoffmann-La Roche in New Jersey.

At the time, the pharmaceutical company's U.S. headquarters was in New Jersey. The company has since relocated its U.S. headquarters to Indiana.

The lawsuits allege that plaintiffs were not properly warned that using Accutane, which was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 1982 for use in fighting acne, could lead to the development of Crohn's disease, irritable bowel disease and other intestinal disorders.

According to the Appellate Division's decision, Brecke began taking Accutane on Sept. 8, 2003, at the age of 23. She began experiencing symptoms later that year, and those symptoms became more acute later that year. She did not file her lawsuit, however, until April 2010, the court said.

Luongo was prescribed Accutane in 1996, when he was 17, and was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis in 2002, but did not file a lawsuit against Hoffmann-La Roche until 2011, the court said.

Boerman began taking Accutane in February 1990, when he was 13. He began experiencing symptoms in 2003 but did not file his lawsuit until 2006, the decision said.

And Zimpfer began using Accutane in December 1999, when he was 17. He began experiencing symptoms in 2004, but did not file his lawsuit until 2007, according to the court.

New Jersey's products liability statute, N.J.S.A. 2A:14-2, has a two-year statute of limitations, and Johnson ruled that the four plaintiffs failed to meet their obligations under the statute.

The Appellate Division affirmed: “All four of these plaintiffs were diagnosed with their ailments more than two years prior to the filing of their complaints.”