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Pharmaceutical Company Held Liable for Lawyer’s Suicide

4/27/17

By: Kristian N. Smith 

A federal jury in Illinois recently held GlaxoSmithKline liable for the death of a Reed Smith LLP partner, Stewart Dolin. The jury found that the generic version of GSK’s Paxil caused Mr. Dolin to take his own life, awarding $3 million to his widow.

Dolin began taking the generic version of Paxil, paroxetine, five days before taking his own life. In the lawsuit, Dolin’s widow claimed the drug caused a heightened anxiety known as “akathisia” in the 57-year-old that caused his death.

The lawsuit claimed that GSK knew about the increased risk of suicide for adults taking paroxetine. The plaintiff alleged the company had hidden data proving the link from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for decades and ignored suicides in its clinical trial. She alleged GSK had evidence paroxetine increases the risk of suicide by older users by as much as 670 percent, yet failed to include that on the warning label.

GSK denied that paroxetine caused Mr. Dolin’s suicide, arguing that the FDA does not require Paxil to come with a warning that it can increase the risk of suicide in adults. The drug’s label does include a “black-box” warning that it can increase the risk of suicidal behavior by users under age 25.

GSK also argued that Mr. Dolin’s suicide was a result of his years-long battle with anxiety and stress related to his work as co-chair of Reed Smith’s corporate and securities practice. GSK presented therapy records showing Mr. Dolin had concerns about his new role at Reed Smith, as well as evidence of other work-related performance issues. Ms. Dolin testified during the trial that while her husband was sometimes anxious, he had developed coping mechanisms to deal with that anxiety and was seeing a therapist at the time of his death.

The lawsuit originally included Mylan, the manufacturer of the generic medication, but a federal judge dismissed Mylan in 2014. Splitting with some previous rulings on this issue, the judge found that even though GSK did not manufacture the drug at issue, it controlled the drug’s design and label, which applied to both the brand name and generic versions. The judge held that Mylan was bound by statute to use GSK’s warning label, and thus GSK was the responsible party.

GSK stated it plans to appeal the verdict.

For any questions, please contact Kristian Smith at ksmith@fmglaw.com.