Trials
Representative Matters
- In re National Football League’s Sunday Ticket Antitrust Litigation. Obtained a complete victory for the NFL and its 32 member teams in a class action lawsuit challenging the distribution of the Sunday Ticket subscription package and the NFL’s overall media strategy. Plaintiffs sought over $21 billion in damages post-trebling as well as injunctive relief that would undermine the NFL’s entire broadcast model. The WS team served as lead counsel throughout the nine-year litigation and ultimately obtained judgment as a matter of law after trial. Relying on the WS team’s cross-examinations of Plaintiffs’ experts and WS’s post-trial briefs, Judge Gutierrez excluded the testimony of Plaintiffs’ key expert witnesses as unreliable, resulting in a complete victory for the NFL.
- Federal Trade Commission v. Microsoft Corporation, et al. Secured a groundbreaking victory for Microsoft in the second-largest merger trial in American history and the biggest involving a technology company over its $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard. Defeated the FTC’s request for a preliminary injunction to stop the transaction after a five-day trial that began less than four weeks after the FTC filed its federal court complaint. Directed all aspects of litigation strategy from the time the acquisition was announced in January 2022, positioning the case for a federal court victory on an unprecedented timeline.
- Clark v. Monsanto Company, et al. After just a day of deliberation, won the first-ever jury verdict for Monsanto in litigation over claims that the herbicide Roundup causes Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma. Clark was the fourth case in this mass tort to go to trial, with the three previous trials resulting in verdicts against Monsanto ranging from $81 million to over $2 billion.
- Farar et al. v. Bayer AG et al. Won an outright defense verdict in a multi-state class action trial involving One A Day vitamins. Plaintiffs alleged that Bayer made false, misleading, and deceptive statements about One A Day. Before trial, Wilkinson Stekloff’s motions practice reduced the potential damages by hundreds of millions of dollars. At trial, based on devastating cross-examinations by Wilkinson Stekloff’s attorneys, the defense rested without calling a single witness. After just over an hour of deliberation, the jury returned a complete defense verdict.
- In the Matter of Altria Group, Inc. and JUUL Labs, Inc. Secured an unprecedented FTC dismissal on behalf of Altria following a month-long administrative trial before the FTC over Altria’s minority investment in JUUL. A February 2022 ruling by the Chief Administrative Law Judge dismissed in their entirety claims by the FTC that Altria and JUUL violated antitrust laws. The matter was on appeal within the FTC, but on June 30, 2023, the FTC dismissed its complaint against Altria.
- In re Xarelto (Rivaroxaban) Products Liability Litigation. Won bellwether trials on behalf of Bayer in mass tort proceedings involving the blood thinner Xarelto. Plaintiffs claimed that Bayer had failed to provide adequate warnings to doctors about risks associated with Xarelto. In the first two federal trials in New Orleans, Wilkinson Stekloff secured unanimous defense verdicts within two hours of closing arguments. Then, in the first three state court trials in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas, Wilkinson Stekloff secured two defense verdicts and a judgment notwithstanding an adverse verdict in a third case.
- Larsen v. Philip Morris USA. Won a complete defense verdict for Altria Group Inc.’s Philip Morris USA unit in a three-week trial in St. Louis, just weeks after the firm’s founding. Plaintiffs sought more than $1.5 billion in compensatory and punitive damages based on claims that the company had deceived smokers with the marketing of Marlboro Lights. The jury issued a complete defense verdict after deliberating for less than an hour.
- McNair v. The National Collegiate Athletic Association et al. Won a defense jury verdict for the NCAA in a defamation suit brought in the Los Angeles Superior Court by former University of Southern California (USC) assistant football coach Todd McNair.
- San Francisco Unified School District v. JUUL Labs, Inc., et al. Served as lead trial counsel for longtime client Altria and some of its subsidiaries in the first bellwether trial in the In re JUUL Labs, Inc. Marketing, Sales Practices, and Products Liability Litigation. On the 13th day of trial, just one day after SFUSD rested its case, plaintiffs agreed to a $235 million global settlement that ended more than 6,000 related cases in state and federal courts.
- City of Stuart v. The 3M Company. Set to serve as lead trial counsel for a major chemical manufacturer in the first bellwether trial in the In re Aqueous Film-Forming Foams (AFFF) Products Liability Litigation. On June 22, 2023, the chemical manufacturer and lead plaintiffs’ counsel announced a settlement to end all water-provider claims brought against the manufacturer.
- Frank v. Monsanto Company, et al. Served as lead trial counsel in the newest front of litigation against Monsanto alleging that both Monsanto’s PCBs and Roundup branded products together cause Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma. After three weeks of trial and just before closing arguments, the case resolved favorably for Monsanto.
- The PNC Financial Services Group, Inc. v. Plaid Inc. Served as lead trial counsel for financial services company Plaid against claims that its service infringed on trademarks of PNC, one of the country’s largest banks. Prevailed in whole or in part on all Daubert motions challenging the reliability of PNC’s four expert witnesses. The case settled on the eve of trial and the parties announced a forward-looking partnership.
- In re National Collegiate Athletic Association Athletic Grant-In-Aid Cap Antitrust Litigation. Served as lead counsel for the NCAA at summary judgment and trial in a challenge by certain current and former NCAA college football and basketball student athletes to NCAA rules limiting the level of athletics-based financial aid benefits that student athletes may receive. Plaintiffs set out to fundamentally change college athletics in America by attacking their defining characteristic – that student athletes are amateurs – making this one of the most important cases in the NCAA’s history. After a three-week bench trial, the district court enjoined certain limitations on benefits that student-athletes may receive but reaffirmed the procompetitive value of the NCAA’s rules and rejected Plaintiffs’ broader-ranging efforts to transform college athletics.
- Zenimax Media, Inc. et al. v. Oculus VR et al. Successfully argued for the Court to dismiss Plaintiffs’ biggest win – a $250 million award for false designation. Represented all Defendants in the case, including Oculus VR and its parent company Facebook. Wilkinson Stekloff prevailed on most of the claims at trial, with Plaintiffs receiving only a small fraction of the damages they sought. In addition to reducing the damages further based on Wilkinson Stekloff’s post-trial arguments, the Court denied Plaintiffs’ motion to enjoin the use of disputed technology in the Oculus Rift headset – allowing Oculus VR to market and sell its products without restriction – and granted Defendants’ motion for sanctions.
- In re Namenda Direct Purchaser Antitrust Litigation. Served as lead counsel for Forest Laboratories and Actavis (now Allergan) in a certified antitrust class action in the Southern District of New York involving a groundbreaking treatment for dementia in Alzheimer’s patients. Plaintiffs claimed that Forest made an anticompetitive “reverse payment” to settle a generic drug manufacturer’s challenge to Namenda, and that Forest unlawfully tried to effectuate a “hard switch” between a twice-daily and once-daily version of Namenda. Plaintiffs claimed approximately $21 billion in trebled damages; the case settled the night before trial for less than 5% of that amount.
- New York v. FedEx Ground Package System Inc. et al. Served as lead counsel for FedEx over allegations that FedEx Ground illegally shipped untaxed cigarettes to residences and businesses in New York. The case was brought by the City and the State of New York under federal and state cigarette laws. The case settled favorably for the client shortly before the trial was scheduled to begin.