LOCAL FAMILY LOSES SUIT BLAMING DRUG MAKER FOR GIRL'S BLINDNESS.

Byline: Brandon Lowrey

Staff Writer

MALIBU -- A Topanga Canyon couple whose young daughter fell severely ill and went blind after taking Children's Motrin for a fever lost their billion-dollar lawsuit Thursday against drug maker Johnson & Johnson.

A Malibu Superior Court jury voted 9-3 in favor of the company, saying it was not liable for Sabrina Brierton Johnson's blindness.

Minutes after the verdict was announced, the family's attorney appeared before news cameras alongside the girl's teary-eyed mother, Joan Johnson, and vowed to appeal the decision.

"We're not going to let this end here," attorney Browne Greene said. "Children are being blinded and killed (and) the public doesn't know about this."

He added that he plans to file suit on behalf of two other families whose children died after using Motrin.

The girl's mother's voice cracked as she lamented the jury's decision.

"It means that nobody cares that she's been blinded and almost tortured to death," she said. "(Drug companies) are giving this to children over the counter and killing them."

Officials with McNeil PPC Inc., part of a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary named in the lawsuit, said they were pleased with the outcome.

Sabrina, now 11, and her parents had sued Johnson & Johnson, alleging that the Motrin failed to present adequate warnings on its packaging label detailing the extent of possible side effects.

"While we are sympathetic to the pain and hardships suffered by Sabrina Johnson, Children's Motrin has been proven safe and effective for treatment of minor aches and pains and fever when used as directed, and the medicine is labeled appropriately," said Marc Boston, spokesman for McNeil Consumer Healthcare, a division of McNeil PPC.

The family's lawsuit asked for $14 million in actual damages, $103 million for pain and suffering and $950 million in punitive damages.

After taking the drug for a fever in 2003, Sabrina contracted Stevens- Johnson syndrome, a rare, debilitating disease that causes blindness, blisters and skin peeling.

During opening statements in the trial last month, one of the family's attorneys, Daniel Balaban, told the jury that Johnson & Johnson spent millions to market the drug when it was approved for over-the-counter use in 1995.

"They marketed it in the most deceitful way. They never let on that this drug had the most serious risks. ... There's nothing on the label to let a mother or a father or a doctor or a nurse know there was a serious risk of Stevens-Johnson syndrome."

But attorneys for the company countered that the federal Food and Drug Administration knew about any possible side effects, and that Stevens- Johnson syndrome rarely occurs.

And, attorneys said, the FDA also asked the company to remove some wording on the warning label several years ago, saying it was too much detail for the average consumer.

The current language on the box includes a warning that the drug could cause severe allergic reactions, which can include hives, asthma and facial swelling.

"This is one of the safest drugs on the market," Johnson & Johnson attorney Thomas Pulliam said during opening statements. "There have been millions of doses sold. What we know is, this likely had nothing to do with Sabrina's injuries."

Nine of the jurors agreed that the Motrin alone did not cause Sabrina's ailment or that a warning would have made a difference.

Juror Robin Nickel said the girl's mother could even bear some of the responsibility.

"The mother testified that she gave Motrin to the girl after she woke up at 7 a.m. with puffy eyes," Nickel said. "It said on the label, 'any new symptoms, call the doctor,' and she didn't do that."

Juror Stara Marx cast one of the dissenting votes.

"I felt there was an inadequate warning and that would have made a difference in how the family used the product," she said. "Certain buzzwords would have triggered a second (look) and maybe changed the way they used the medication."

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(color) Five years ago, Sabrina Johnson, now 11, contracted Stevens-Johnson syndrome, a rare, debilitating disease that causes blindness, blisters and skin peeling.