Pharmacy Not Immune to Failure-To-Warn Claims, Federal Judge Rules

CHARLESTON, W. Va. - A West Virginia federal judge has remanded an Ambien failure-to-warn case, ruling that the pharmacy defendant, a West Virginia citizen, was not fraudulently joined because it is not shielded from liability under West Virginia case law. Hartman v. Caraco Pharmaceutical Laboratories Ltd., No. 10-1319 (S.D. W.Va.).

On April 29, Judge John T. Copenhaver Jr. of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia relied upon case law providing that neither West Virginia Code Section 30-5-12(a) nor the learned intermediary doctrine shields pharmacies from failure-to-warn claims.

Kimberly Hartman, a West Virginia citizen, was …