Discovery Deadlines in Covidien Hernia Mesh Lawsuits Extended by MDL Judge

As lawyers continue efforts to prepare a small group of Covidien hernia mesh lawsuits for early “bellwether” trials, a U.S. Magistrate Judge has extended the deadlines for completing general discovery and expert discovery, giving the parties until July 2025 to select the first case that will go before a jury.

Covidien faces more than 1,500 product liability lawsuits in the federal court system, as well as hundreds of additional claims pending in Massachusetts state court, each raising similar allegations that painful and debilitating complications were caused be defectively designed hernia mesh systems sold in recent years, including Covidien Parietex, Covidien Symbotex and others.

Given common questions of fact and law raised in the complaints, the federal litigation is centralized for pretrial proceedings before U.S. District Judge Patti B. Saris in the District of Massachusetts, as part of a Covidien mesh MDL (multidistrict litigation), where the parties have been preparing a small group of representative claims for early trial dates, which are expected to begin in late 2025 or early 2026.

The discovery proceedings have been marked by disputes between plaintiffs and Covidien, about which documents the manufacturer must turn over. This has resulted in a number of delays in preparing Covidien hernia mesh lawsuits for bellwether trials, which will be used to gauge how juries may respond to certain evidence and testimony likely to be repeated throughout large numbers of claims.

On December 2, the parties filed a joint motion (PDF) asking for a 60-day extension of certain deadlines approaching over the next six months.

“The Parties believe good cause exists for a short extension of the case schedule to allow fact discovery to be completed before expert discovery begins, to prevent the need to amend expert reports and/or re-depose experts if new information is discovered during the completion of fact discovery,” the motion states. “No trial dates have been set, so a short extension will not meaningfully alter the overall case schedule.”

U.S. Magistrate Judge M. Page Kelly issued a case management order (PDF) late last week, approving the extension, but maintaining the deadline for parties to complete mediation efforts by September 22, 2025, and submit proposals for the timing of trials by September 26, 2025.

According to the order, the deadline for completing general corporate discovery has been extended to February 7, 2025, and all expert discovery must now be completed by July 28, 2025.  As a result, the parties have now been directed to identify the specific Covidien hernia mesh lawsuit that will be the first to go to trial by July 11, 2025..

In addition, the order sets deadlines for dispositive and Daubert motions to be filed by August 8, with opposition to those motions due by September 12. Any replies in support of these motions for selected tiral cases must be filed no later than September 26, 2025.

Despite the extensions, the parties must still identify a mediator by February 10, 2025, who will work with lawyers involved in the case to begin Covidien hernia mesh settlement talks over the subsequent seven months.

If the parties are unable to reach global agreements to settle large numbers of cases, it is expected that a series of early bellwether trials will be held in the MDL. While the outcomes of these trials will not be binding on other plaintiffs, the average Covidien hernia mesh lawsuit payouts may help determine the amount the manufacturer may need to pay to avoid each case going to trial separately in the coming years.