A Philadelphia jury recently returned a verdict awarding a 16-year-old teenager who suffered injuries after taking Risperdal $70 million in compensation. The manufacturer of the drug is Johnson & Johnson, a major international pharmaceutical and health care products company. According to the teenager’s complaint, Johnson & Johnson failed to provide appropriate warnings with the drug that it could cause him to grow breasts, referred to in the medical community as gynecomastia. According to his complaint, the plaintiff started taking Risperdal when he was five years old to address a psychiatric disorder.
The plaintiff also alleged that Johnson & Johnson intentionally prevented doctors and health care professionals from seeing the adverse results of a study about Risperdal that showed it could cause abnormal breast growth in boys.
Risperdal is an antipsychotic medication used to treat a number of mental disorders like bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and irritability in autism patients. Signs of gynecomastia include puffy nipples, enlarged nipples, painful breasts, nipple discharge, and breast growth. The results of gynecomastia in boys can be devastating, resulting in serious emotional and mental pain while also frequently requiring a mastectomy to remove the breast growth.
This represents the fifth ruling against Johnson & Johnson regarding its alleged failure to warn patients about the risks of taking Risperdal. The verdict is substantially larger than the $2.5 million verdict awarded in 2015 to an autistic plaintiff in Alabama who grew size 46DD breasts as a result of taking Risperdal. During the trial on this case, it was suggested that Janssen, the division of Johnson & Johnson that markets and sells Risperdal, knew about the side effect as early as 2001. Another jury awarded a plaintiff who developed breasts after taking Risperdal $1.75 million in another case that same year. In December 2015, a jury awarded $500,000 to another man with similar allegations.
And in 2013, Johnson & Johnson entered into a $2.2 billion global settlement to address allegations that it had marketed Risperdal to children and elderly patients illegally. This represented one of the harshest settlements against a health care company in history.
The drug manufacturer is being sued by at least 1,500 plaintiffs who allege similar side effects and breast-growth conditions after taking Risperdal. Most of the cases have been filed or transferred to a Philadelphia court. To recover compensation from a drug manufacturer, a plaintiff must show that the defendant knew or should have known about the alleged side effects and that the company failed to provide adequate warnings to users about the side effects.
At Moll Law Group, our Risperdal lawyers are actively investigating cases involving male breast growth as a result of taking Risperdal. The emotional and mental trauma that can result from this condition is devastating, and plaintiffs who were not appropriately warned about the side effects should be compensated fairly for their harm. Proudly serving clients throughout the United States, including in Illinois, Texas, California, and New York, we offer a free consultation in person or over the phone to discuss your potential case and how we may be able to help you. We treat each client with the attention, compassion, and dedication that they deserve. Call us now at 312-462-1700 or contact us online to get started.
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