For immediate release

Montgomery, Alabama (June 1, 2007) -The State of Alabama will now proceed with the individual cases filed against the 73 pharmaceutical companies. Today's ruling by the Alabama Supreme Court simply says that the state cannot try the cases against all defendants in one trial or a series of trials involving multiple defendants. We will now ask the trial judge to consolidate groups of cases for trial under Rule 42 (a) of the Alabama Rules of Civil Procedure. The availability of consolidated trials is clearly available to the state as pointed out by Justice Champ Lyons and Chief Justice Sue Bell Cobb. The law on that point is well settled in Alabama. We will ask the trial judge to grant relief to the state pursuant to Rule 42 (a) and to follow the recommendations made by Justice Lyons and Chief Justice Cobb.

Jere Beasley, one of the lawyers for the state, stated, "We should be able to keep the November trial date which is crucial to the State of Alabama. The damages available to the state in this case will be in the range of $600 million in compensatory damages and we will also ask the court to allow us to proceed on punitive damages which would be approximately $1.8 billion. We will prove that the pharmaceutical companies intentionally committed fraud against the State of Alabama and as a result cheated the citizens of Alabama."

About Beasley Allen
Headquartered in Montgomery, Alabama, Beasley Allen is comprised of over 45 attorneys and 200 support staff. Beasley Allen is a national leader in civil litigation, having settled verdicts and settlements amounting to nearly $15 billion. Beasley Allen has been litigating Vioxx cases for more than five years since November 2001-three years before the drug was pulled off the market.

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