Maryland Injury Lawyer Blog

Baltimore City Chief Judge Joseph H.H. Kaplan officially retires tomorrow after a long distinguished career on the bench. He is replaced as Chief Judge by Judge Clifton J. Gordy, who will be retiring himself in November. I have been in front of Judge Gordy and Judge Kaplan in the last year (regrettably losing motions before both judges). I also had a week long trial in front of Judge Gordy a few years ago. Judge Gordy and Judge Kaplan are both highly respected by plaintiffs' and defense lawyers in Baltimore. Moreover, they always treated the lawyers and parties that came before them with respect. They will be misssed.

I provide data from Jury Verdict Research frequently on this blog because I think it is helpful for personal injury lawyers to see how specific classes of cases fare nationally. Below is a list of recovery percentages in truck accident cases that go to trial:

Broadside Collisions: 61%

Head-On Collisions 71%

Intersection Collisions 58%

Multiple Vehicle Collisions 73%

No Contact Accidents 52%

Truck, Overall 60%

Jury Verdict Research also offers statistics on the median compensatory awards for a few different categories of truck accidents:

Head-On Collisions: $532,034

Intersection Collisions: $ 85,000

Truck Accidents Overall $ 90,000

I suspect that most Maryland truck accident lawyers would agree that both likelihood of recovery and the amount of the recovery is higher in Maryland, but I have never seen any state specific data on truck accident cases. If anyone knows of any data in Maryland or in any other state, please let me know.

The Maryland Daily Record published in an interview on Friday with Maryland Court of Appeals Chief Judge Robert M. Bell who had some interesting comments on seeking certiorari that I think would be of interest to any personal injury lawyer seeking appeal to a higher court where the appeal is not a matter of right. Below is an excerpt of that interview as it relates to petitions for certiorari:

Question: What are the most important points that lawyers and their clients should bear in mind when preparing a petition for certiorari?

Answer: When drafting a petition for certiorari, one should focus on getting the court interested in the case, so one should be focused on what makes that case unique. And the more one is able to do that concisely, the more likely it is that the court is going to be inclined to grant certiorari. Also, bear in mind that the court is not going to be particularly interested in reviewing the case if it has 10 or 12 issues; the fewer points of interest, the more likely it is that we will take the case.

Question: What is the biggest mistake lawyers make in the petition for certiorari?

Answer: I think they don't realize that you don't have to present a long petition; rather, you only need to highlight that your case involves an issue that is critical or interesting to the bench and/or the bar. Focus on that. In order to pique the court's interest, one should focus on crafting the fact pattern, along with the legal underpinning of the case, both of which can effectively crystallize the issue being presented for certiorari.

Question: Which is more important to the court when considering a petition for certiorari, the argument presented in the petition or the highlighting of the public policy issue involved?

Answer: I think it is a little bit of both. I think it is a combination of both because you don't have much of a chance of getting the petition granted unless you can show that it is an important issue. However, it need not necessarily be an issue of public policy. It could be an issue involving a novel interpretation of the law.

I think the point is that you have to put yourself in the role of the judges. Personal injury lawyers are wrapped up in how the outcome will impact their clients but it will be hard to get the attention of the Maryland Court of Appeals if the impact of the case does not go beyond effect on the parties to the case. A petition for certiorari is a foreign form of legal advocacy for the personal injury lawyer because the fight is not to win the case. The end game of the petition is not to persuade the court that the Maryland Court of Special Appeals (our intermediate appellate court for non-Marylanders) was wrong in their holding. Instead, a cert petition should focus on persuading the court that the case matters not only to the instant litigants, but future litigants for years to come.

Personal injury lawyers in Maryland and around the country are increasing using focus groups to give accident and medical malpractice cases a test run with mock juries. When I was a defense lawyer, we had a case where we spent over $100,000 on jury consultants and focus groups, culminating in a two day run with several mock juries who heard a great deal of detail about the case that was to be tried. Naturally, after a four month trial, we lost; the jury awarded the Plaintiff a multimillion dollar verdict. But the focus group process done on that level was fascinating. We watched the mock jurors through one way mirrors as they deliberated. It was amazing to see one juror misinterpret the evidence and then the next juror build off the prior juror's error. Still, it was also impressive to see how well some of the mock juries understood the case in a relatively short period of time.

Of course, most cases will not support economically a venture of that magnitude. But some lawyers have become so sophiscated about mock juries that they can conduct their own focus groups to assist in predicting what the real jury will decide in a given case. Just as importantly, particularly in Maryland where voir dire is very limited, focus groups can also help lawyers determine in demographic and attitudinal terms which jurors are most (and least) likely to be receptive to the lawyer's client.

If you are interested in doing your own focus groups, there is a great article on the web by David Ball that tells you how personal injury lawyers can do their own focus groups for less than $1,000.

Mitch Jackson's MyTrialBlog has a great post on the importance not only of getting your evidence to the jury but getting your evidence to the jury smoothly. One way to lose credibility with a jury is to fumble your way through getting your evidence admitted. The key: from the minute a lawyer files a lawsuit, he or she should be thinking about what must be admitted and how they are going to do it. One easy thing our lawyers do is get our foundation pieces in place during discovery. Requests for admission, for example, can help you get early admission that documents are authentic, kept in the regular course of business, etc. The time to figure out what you need to do to get your evidence to the jury should begin long before you begin preparing to actually try the case.

The Maryland Trial Lawyers Auto Negligence Seminar will be held on Friday, November 10, 2006 (the courts are closed that day in observance of Veterans' Day) at the Comfort Inn Conference Center, 4500 Crain Highway (Route 301) Bowie, Maryland 20716 from 9:00 am - 3:00 pm. For registration forms, click here. This should be a great seminar for Maryland personal injury lawyers trying auto accident cases. The topics and speakers are:

Panel 1: Trying an Auto Case Before a Jury
Speakers: Circuit Court Judges
The Honorable W. Michel Pierson - Baltimore City
The Honorable Joseph P. Manck - Anne Arundel
The Honorable Diane O. Leasure - Howard
The Honorable Eric M. Johnson - Montgomery
The Honorable Thomas P. Smith - Prince George's

Panel 2: How to Place Your Case in a Position to Settle, Mediate or Arbitrate
Speakers: In-house Counsel
Robert Graham Fiore - Nationwide
Timothy Scot Smith - State Farm
Karen A. Besok - Geico
Jill Reid Cummins - Allstate

A preliminary study reported in Developmental Medicine and Child Neurology found that low doses of pamidronate increase bone density in children with spastic cerebral palsy (CP). All of the children in the study had spastic quadriplegia, a severe form of cerebral palsy characterized by muscle stiffness in all four limbs and the mouth and tongue. These cerebral palsy victims often have decreased mobility and cognitive deficiencies. The hope is that this new drug improves bone density, ameliorating a weakness in many cerebral palsy victims who, because of their decreased mobility, are at higher risk for fractures.

The University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha studied 23 children with severe cerebral palsy and were unable to walk. At the beginning of the study, the patients' bone mineral density was below the normal level for children their age. After a year, the Nebraska researchers found significant increases in the bone mineral density. Nine children had at least one fracture and up to five fractures prior to the study. Only one fracture occurred during the 12-month treatment period and the average annual fracture rate fell from 0.98 to 0.004 per year.

What a blessing it would be if science could make more dramatic advances for cerebral palsy victims. This drug is not a panacea for people who suffer from cerebral palsy. But progress is progress. Let's hope it keeps coming.

This month, the Maryland Court of Special Appeals decided the case of Veytsman z. New York Palace, Inc. The issue in Veytsman was whether a nightclub had a duty to protect its patrons from being attacked by fellow patrons. The Maryland Court of Special Appeals found that the nightclub had no such duty, affirming Baltimore City Circuit Judge Evelyn Omega Cannon’s ruling. The opinion underscores how difficult it is to hold nightclubs responsible for altercations that invariably occur in nightclubs, bars and restaurants.

In this case, Plaintiffs were having dinner at the New York Palace, which has since closed but was once a hip hangout for Baltimore’s Russian community, on the same evening as a wedding reception. As is often the case when alcohol is involved, an altercation arose between Plaintiffs and the wedding party. Plaintiffs’ Baltimore personal injury attorneys alleged in their Complaint that Plaintiffs were physically assaulted.

The question posed to the Maryland Court of Special Appeals is whether the nightclub had a duty to protect Plaintiff from an attack by third parties. The court set forth the three circumstances under which a landowner may be held liable when someone is injured by a third party criminal activity:

1. Breach of the duty to eliminate conditions that contributed to the criminal activity (such as providing security personnel, lighting, locks and the like) when this duty was based on knowledge of prior similar incidents, not on knowledge of facts relating to the incident in question;

2. Knowledge of prior conduct of the assailant that allegedly made the assault foreseeable and preventable; or

3. Knowledge of events occurring on the premises, prior to and leading up to the assault, which made imminent harm foreseeable.

In this case, the Maryland Court of Special Appeals found that Plaintiff had no evidence that New York Palace had advance notice that an altercation might arise, nor did it delay in acting to protect the Plaintiffs from the aggressors once the brawl began.

Of course, Plaintiffs do have a claim against the individuals who attacked them. But it is hard to find a personal injury lawyer in Baltimore who will take a case against individuals without insurance because of the difficulties in collecting money, even if the Defendants do have money to satisfy a judgment. I learned this the hard way after bringing a case against an NFL punter with the Carolina Panthers (now with the Denver Broncos). This Defendant had millions of dollars in assets. Eventually, we did collect but it took a few years. The moral of this story is absent compelling circumstances, if an attorney thinks he or she will have problems collecting on a judgment, it is probably not a case worth taking.

The Maryland Personal Injury Lawyer Blog has been blessed recently with a fury of relevant Maryland appellate court opinions. Next week, I will try to get to Bowser v. Resh, an interesting Garrett County, Maryland car accident case that discusses negligent entrustment law in Maryland, a topic of particular importance to Maryland truck accident lawyers.

In the last few years in our practice, our nursing home neglect and abuse lawyers have seen an increasing number of new client calls questioning the quality of the care that a family member or friend is receiving in a nursing home. More than 1.5 million Americans are in nursing homes with 30,000 of them in Maryland. That number is rising fast as America continues to age. Baltimore County alone has 49 nursing homes and 299 assisted-living facilities.

There are a lot of great nursing homes in Maryland that are doing a fantastic job. In fact, the Maryland Health Care Commission reports that Marylanders are generally satisfied with the quality of nursing homes where their relatives reside. Still, there are other reports that are very disturbing. A few years ago, a former employee of Genesis Health Care's Heritage Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, was found guilty in Baltimore District Court of abuse of a vulnerable adult arising out of an assault on a 74 year-old female nursing home resident. Prosecutors said the perpetrator slapped the woman, who was suffering from advanced Alzheimer's, in the face in anger and with such force that the sound of the blow could be heard across the room. The reason given for this outburst was the patient would not stop scratching herself as the nursing assistants were changing her diaper.

Folks, it does not get much more awful than that. I feel a rage from recounting that story. Can you imagine if it was your parent or grandparents? Just awful. There is an opportunity for Maryland nursing home lawyers to step into situations like this not simply to obtain compensation for the victims but to send a message to the nursing homes that while it might not appear that society is watching them as they sit in their nursing homes abusing and mistreating these people that deserve our love and respect, justice will eventually be done.

Nursing home lawyers are everywhere in Florida, which has the oldest population in the country. But soon the rest of the nation will also be almost as gray as Florida is today. Accordingly, I would expect more lawyers to step into this nursing home fight for the least protected of us (that deserve the most protection).

According to Jury Verdict Research, 60 percent of personal injury trials involving nursing home abuse or neglect result in plaintiff verdicts. The median verdict is $192,977. The median verdict alleging malpractice in the treatment of a nursing home patient is $275,000.

On Tuesday, the American Transportation Research Institute, the research arm of the American Trucking Association, released the results of its industry analysis of the use of recorders to monitor driver hours. The study showed, not surprisingly, that few fleets use electronic on-board recorders, but those that do report increased driver morale. This research contradicts the hypothesis that even truck accident lawyer had: that “big brother” tracking devices would hurt driver morale and retention. Seventy-six percent of users said the recorders had improved driver morale and 19 percent said they had improved driver retention.

Obviously, there are concerns about data privacy and data access issues. But as any Maryland truck accident lawyer can tell you, there are too many deaths in Maryland due to tired drivers logging more hours than federal law allows. It is difficult for profit maximizing trucking companies and businesses that specialize in local pickup and delivery service not to push the envelope because they believe their competitors are. A universal requirement that these companies use recorders that monitor driver hours might level the playing field, keeping tired commercial truck drivers off the road. The downside risk to these recorders would be truck drivers driving faster to make up for the lost hours.

On July 31st, the Maryland Personal Injury Lawyer Blog wrote a blog post about the concerns sitting Baltimore City Circuit Court judges John C. Themelis, Gale E. Rasin and Barry G. Williams had about their "alphabetically challenged" last names in this year's election. It appears as these sitting Baltimore judges have fought through that obstacle, defeating challengers Baltimore lawyer Nicholas J. Del Pizzo, III and Baltimore City District Court Judge Emanuel Brown. Similarly, the Baltimore County sitting judges up for election - Robert E. Cahill Jr., Judith C. Ensor, Timothy J. Martin and Mickey J. Norman - also appear to have defeated their two challengers, William R. Buie III and Arthur M. Frank. These are early returns but the results are expected to hold up.

Almost every Maryland lawyer I have spoken to regarding these contested elections dislikes this process of Maryland judges facing elections. Yet election and election it continues without any major effort to change the process.

The Maryland Court of Special Appeals today decided the informed consent medical malpractice case of Mahler v. Johns Hopkins University. The court overturned a Baltimore City Circuit Court judge’s decision to grant a motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict to Johns Hopkins and a defendant doctor.

In this case, the Plaintiff underwent plastic surgery to improve the cosmetic appearance of his chin in 1993. The surgery was performed at Johns Hopkins Hospital by the Defendant surgeon. As a result of that surgery, he suffered permanent disfigurement. Plaintiff argued that there was no informed consent because the Defendant surgeon did not disclose the material risks of the surgery to him. Plaintiff hired a Baltimore medical malpractice attorney, who brought suit against the surgeon and Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland.

This case was tried twice. The first trial ended in a verdict for the Plaintiff and an award of $50,000 in economic damages and $500,000 in non-economic damages. Interestingly, the trial judge, Baltimore City Circuit Court Judge Allen Schwait, believed that he had erred in allowing certain evidence at trial (and because he found it excessive as well). To remedy his error, he reduced the malpractice verdict to to $112,500 ($100,000 in non-economic damages and $12,500 in economic damages).

In Maryland, the Plaintiff can either accept a remittitur or reject it and seek a new trial. Plaintiff sought a new trial. After the second trial ended with the Baltimore City jury hung, the court (another Baltimore City Circuit Court judge) granted Johns Hopkins' motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict (JNOV) on the basis that the Plaintiff did not make out a prima facie case informed consent case.

There were a lot of issues of interest regarding cumulative expert testimony and the appropriate designation of experts that were resolved in the Defendants’ favor under the “discresion of the trial court” umbrella. It still makes for an interesting read in a unique fact pattern involving expert designations over the course of two different cases. The case also quotes a lively exchange between counsel (both well respected Maryland medical malpractice attorneys) at a deposition where one of the lawyers dealt with a dispute by hanging up the phone (which later recieved the court’s tacit approval).

Still, the Maryland Court of Special Appeals overruled the Baltimore City Circuit Court Judge on the grounds that the court believed that there was sufficient evidence to go to the jury on the question of informed consent. If the jury believed the testimony regarding the risks of the plastic surgery included permanent specific risks and the testimony of the Plaintiff was that these risks were not disclosed, it could have reasonably found that these risks were material and that a reasonable person in the Plaintiff’s position would not have had the surgery, had he been known of those risks.

Jury Verdict Research provides some interesting national data on the likelihood of recovery at trial in a medical malpractice case for various different types of claims:

Catheterization: 39%

Failed Sterilization: 35%

Foreign Object Left in Body: 66%

Lack of Informed Consent: 25%

Post-surgical Infection: 43%

Medical Malpractice Overall: 36%

This is very interesting data for medical malpractice attorneys, particularly with respect to the recovery rates for post-surgical infection. Obviously, the least likely to prevail in these claims is a medical malpractice claim based on informed consent. But in a medical malpractice claim in Maryland based on informed consent, as this case demonstrates, it is relatively easy to get the case to the jury.

In Maryland, medical malpractice lawyers are not required to obtain expert medical testimony to establish the breach of the doctor's duty, but such medical expert testimony is required to establish the (1) nature of the risks inherent in a particular treatment, (2) probabilities of therapeutic success, (3) frequency of the occurrence of particular risks, (4) nature of available alternatives to treatment and (5)whether or not disclosure would be detrimental to a patient. In fact, under Maryland law, this testimony can also be provided by the testimony of the defendant medical doctor (which is exactly what happened in this case).

In summary, this medical malpractice case is an interesting read both on the law and the facts. Click here to read the full Maryland Court of Appeals opinion.

Last month, the Maryland Court of Appeals decided the case of Food Lion v. McNeill. The issue in McNeill is whether the testimony of an expert may be excluded at trial on the basis of a disclosure made during discovery in response to interrogatories, that has neither been claimed nor determined to be a discovery violation, but that is challenged at trial as deficient for failing to provide information as required by Maryland Rule 2-402(f)(1)(A).

In this case, Plaintiff designated Dr. Edwin C. Fulton to testify as an expert witness in a trial in front of Judge Pamela L. North in Anne Arundel County, Maryland. Dr. Fulton was expected to testify that Food Lion employee Daniel McNeill suffered from “pain and numbness in his hands and pain radiating from his elbows” and was subsequently diagnosed with bilateral carpal tunnel syndrome as well as right cubital tunnel syndrome. Furthermore, he intended to testify that these injuries resulted from McNeill’s employment as a meat cutter at the Glen Burnie Food Lion.

During the pre-trial discovery process, Defendant asked the standard interrogatory of McNeill’s Maryland attorneys, requesting the names of those people he might expect to act as expert witnesses, the subject matter on which they would testify, the substance of each expert’s findings and opinions and a summary of the grounds upon which each opinion was based. In response to this interrogatory, McNeill’s attorney provided a one sentence letter from Dr. Fulton, simply stating that Dr. Fulton believed Mr. McNeill’s injuries resulted from his repetitive meat cutting duties at Food Lion. Although this information did not include any grounds upon which the opinion was based, the Defendant’s attorney made no challenges or objections to it during the time of discovery.

Obviously, the spirt of the rule is to provide some indication of the expected testimony of the experts, at least in general form. After sitting on this deficiency in discovery, Food Lion’s lawyers made a motion to disallow Dr. Fulton’s testimony due to the fact that, during the discovery process, Maryland Rule 2-402 requires an expert witness to provide not only his or her opinion but also the grounds upon which it is based. Specifically, they argued that the opinion simply stated that his conditions related to his work as a meat cutter and not whether his injury was caused my his job duties. Judge North agreed with the Defendant’s attorney and barred Dr. Fulton’s testimony, which essentially killed Plaintiff’s case. Plaintiff appealed.

The procedure here was unusual. An en banc panel of the Circuit Court reversed Judge North’s decision. Food Lion timely noted an appeal to the Maryland Court of Special Appeals. The Maryland Court of Appeals, on its own motion, granted certiorari before it reached the Maryland Court of Special Appeals. See Food Lion v. McNeill, 380 Md. 232, 844 A.2d 428 (2004). The Maryland Court of Appeals agreed with the en banc panel that Defendant should not be permitted to wait to raise the discovery deficiency at trial, finding that a “party who answers a discovery request timely and does not receive any indication from the other party that the answers are inadequate or otherwise deficient should be able to rely, for discovery purposes, on the absence of a challenge as an indication that those answers are in compliance, and, thus not later subject to challenge as inadequate and deficient when offered at trial.”

Specifically, the Court addressed Food Lion’s attorney’s argument that he did not object to the form of the answer that the appellee gave to its discovery request and wanted only to test the sufficiency of the basis of the appellee’s expert’s opinion. As of that time, it was under no obligation to challenge the appellee’s answer, or take the appellee’s expert’s deposition, notwithstanding his belief that the appellee had violated discovery. The Court responded that this will take Maryland “to the time when non-disclosure was the order of the day and disclosure was not encouraged and when discovery was an obstacle course.”

I agree with this holding from the Maryland Court of Appeals. Fair play dictates that personal injury lawyers in Maryland are not permitted to sandbag the opposing party with discovery deficiencies that can be easily remedied and then raise the deficiencies at trial. I think the Maryland Court of Appeals agreed that this elevates form or substance which is clearly not the purpose of the Maryland Rule of Procedure and the Maryland Rules of Evidence.

I found a great new trial blog I found while I was on vacation, My Trial Blog, written by California personal injury lawyer Mitch Jackson. While Mitch was kind enough to write a review of our Maryland Personal Injury Help Center, I mention his work on the Maryland Personal Injury Lawyer Blog because his blog is absolutely fantastic. Like the Maryland Personal Injury Lawyer Blog, the purpose of My Trial Blog is to pass along quality tips to other personal injury lawyers. Mitch offers a great deal of detail in his posts as to the nuances of trial practice, not the garden variety advice that is pretty obvious to most trial lawyers. I'm putting this blog on my favorites list.

Last week was the Miller & Zois attorney retreat in the Outer Banks of North Carolina. Our lawyers have returned to Maryland today ready to get back to practicing law. The Maryland Personal Injury Lawyer blog will also return this week. So check in regularly for new posts as I try to make up for lost time.

A number of personal injury lawyers in Maryland are focusing on Fosamax® (Alendronate Sodium), a drug manufactured by Merck that is commonly used to treat patients with osteoporosis and Paget's disease. The drug is prescribed to strengthen the bones and prevent fractures in patients who have osteoporosis or who are otherwise at risk for bone fractures and other bone related conditions. For many, Fosamax has been a great drug. Paradoxically, these drugs can cause just the opposite effect. Accordingly, Fosamax and other bisphosphonates such as Aredia®, Zometa®, Actonel® and Boniva®, have drawn great interest from personal injury lawyers in Maryland and around the country. These drugs have been linked to Osteonecrosis of the Jaw (also called “ONJ,” “Dead Jaw” or “Jaw Death”). ONJ involves the breakdown or death of the jawbone, frequently leading to serious infection or fractures. Because Fosamax is the largest seller it has drawn the most interest from lawyers.

Unfortunately, many patients who take Fosamax, or a similar drug, have done so for years because the medication needs to be taken regularly to be continually efficacious. Many “Fosamax lawyers” think Fosamax is the next great mass tort wave in Maryland, and accordingly, many Baltimore attorneys are gearing up to recruit Fosamax victims. Our lawyers have been looking at Fosamax cases in recent months. I am not sure that Fosamax will be the next great mass tort, but for the selected number of people who appear to have suffered substantial injuries, these cases will be significant. My guess is that Fosamax will one day be an MDL class action. However, it is hard for Fosamax lawyers to gauge the full extent of the side effects of Fosamax because Fosamax’s half life is approximately 10 years. In other words, Fosamax users will still have half of the Fosamax that they have taken in their body 10 years after they have stopped taking the drug. Putting this in some context, the half life of Zoloft® is 26 hours. That makes Fosamax’s half life approximately 3500 times that of Zoloft. The practical effect of this is that Fosamax lawyers cannot predict the scope of the Fosamax problem because, with such a long half life, it remains to be seen how much damage Fosamax will cause.

What is interesting is that if you Google “Fosamax”, in the paid for advertising, you first get Merck’s Fosamax advertisement encouraging people to use Fosamax. The second listed add is a Maryland personal injury lawyer’s advertisement for Fosamax. Merck’s only mention in their advertisement of the side effect that has started this firestorm is on its list of “Selected Cautionary Information about FOSAMAX and FOSAMAX PLUS.” On this list is an advisory to Fosamax users: if “you develop severe bone, joint, and/or muscle pain at any time, contact your doctor.” It seems as though Fosamax users are contacting their doctor … and a lawyer.

Merck lawyers are seeking bank and cell phone records that may shed more light on a juror's financial relationship with a Texas plaintiff who was awarded $32 million against Merck for death of a 71-year-old man who took Vioxx. One juror apparently borrowed $10,000 interest free from the decedent's widow (the plaintiff in the Vioxx case). The juror said the loans included $2,500 that was paid off just weeks before he was selected as a juror in the case. The juror also produced cell phone records that showed calls by him to the plaintiff.

Last month, I wrote a couple of blog posts (click here and here) deriding the defendant doctor's medical malpractice lawyers for going after jurors financial disclosures and prior claims history after an adverse verdict. But this is completely different. A loan and telephone calls to the plaintiff just after he was selected for jury duty, these are the classic juror misconduct issues. Even a mere acquittance with the plaintiff is something that should be revealed during the voir dire practice. Regrettably, if these allegations hold up, I will agree with the trial judge if he choses to void the judgment against Merck and declare a mistrial.

The risk associated with silver dental fillings made with mercury that plug cavities in the teeth of millions of Americans will be evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration again this week in light of persistent reports of health risks associated with mercury in general and specifically with silver dental fillings. The FDA will ask an outside panel of experts if it believes there is cause for further concern. I have complained in the past about the objectivity of these advisory boards when it comes to pharmaceutical drugs. With this issue related to mercury, however, I suspect they have found an unbiased group of experts.

At certain levels, mercury is toxic to the brain and kidneys. The conventional wisdom has been that the mercury vapors emitted from fillings are too low to cause injury. But conventional wisdom in medicine changes over time and the issues related to mercury are gaining attention from Maryland personal injury lawyers who are increasingly hearing reports from prospective clients complaining of injury as the result of the use of mercury.