Ropes & Gray Partner Comments on Supreme Court Decision to Review Securities Suit Against Pharmaceutical Company
Douglas Hallward-Driemeier, head of the Appellate and Supreme Court practice at Ropes & Gray, has been quoted in the press regarding the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to review the case of Matrixx Initiatives v. Siracusano. In this case, which will have significant implications for the pharmaceutical industry, as well as for securities litigation in general, the court will decide whether firms must publicly disclose adverse event reports that are not statistically significant.
Commenting in leading pharmaceutical trade report, The Pink Sheet Daily, on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit’s decision to be reviewed by the Supreme Court, Hallward-Driemeier said, “It raises the question if any fact in hindsight might be viewed by a juror as something he would want to have known.”
Hallward-Driemeier also told Law 360, “The Ninth Circuit decision could have had an extremely broad impact on the industry, effectively requiring them to disclose all adverse drug reports - and deluging investors with information that's not really going to be helpful to them.”
Hallward-Driemeier joined Ropes & Gray in 2010 after spending more than a decade handling appeals and Supreme Court litigation for the U.S. Department of Justice. Between 2004 and 2009, as an Assistant to the Solicitor General, he briefed and argued cases on behalf of the United States before the Supreme Court. He has argued 13 cases before the Supreme Court and filed more than 150 briefs in that Court. Most recently, in November 2009, he argued Graham County v. U.S. ex rel. Wilson, concerning the scope of the public disclosure bar to suits under the False Claims Act.