Focus: Defective Drugs and Devices
Phone: (212) 558-5500
Fax: (212) 344-5461
New York Office:
700 Broadway
New York, NY 10003
Practicing for three dozen years representing people injured by dangerous products — including medications, medical devices, and toxic chemicals — I have observed a terrible unifying theme. Manufacturing corporations fail to do the right thing: whether it be inadequately testing the product before releasing it on the market (and in our clients’ bodies); failing to adequately warn consumers and workers of the risks; and, most egregiously, deferring corrective action because that would impact their bottom line. All these failures sadly boil down to the defendants’ concern for profits over safety. I have had the pleasure of representing thousands of wonderful clients and it is heartbreaking to see how many lives have been devastated by the defendants’ conduct. Every day, I am grateful that I can help clients obtain compensation for the wrongs they have suffered.
Ms. Relkin, whose practice focuses on medical device and pharmaceutical product liability, as well as toxic tort matters, has represented thousands of plaintiffs injured by defective medical products for more than three decades. She has been appointed by numerous federal and state judges to serve as the leadership counsel running large, consolidated litigations.
She was most recently appointed as co-lead counsel in the multidistrict litigation In Re: Exactech Polyethylene Orthopedics Product Liability Litigation in the Eastern District of New York. She is co-lead counsel of the In Re: JUUL Labs, Inc. Marketing, Sales Practices and Products Liability Litigation, where she helped negotiate settlements on behalf of consumers and government entities of over $500 million dollars with defendants for their conduct in creating a vaping epidemic. She has served as the co-lead counsel of the In Re: DePuy ASR multidistrict litigation in the Northern District of Ohio, resulting in a global settlement. She played a key role in negotiating settlements exceeding $2.5 billion. She also served as court appointed co-lead counsel in the In Re: Farxiga (Dapagliflozin) Products Liability Litigation that was venued in the Southern District of New York.
On the state court front, she has been court-appointed lead and liaison counsel in the New Jersey state court multicounty litigations: In Re: Stryker Rejuvenate & ABG II Modular Hip Implant Litigation; In Re: Stryker LFit CoCr V49 Femoral Heads Litigation; and, previously, in the In Re: Yaz Product Liability Litigation. In addition to roles as lead counsel of litigations, she has been court appointed to the Executive Committees in the multidistrict litigations, In Re: National Prescription Opiate Litigation; In Re: Stryker LFIT V40 Femoral Head Products Liability Litigation, In Re: Invokana (Canagliflozin) Products Liability Litigation; and In Re: Ortho Evra Product Liability Litigation.
Ms. Relkin, who is Certified by the New Jersey Supreme Court as a Civil Trial Attorney, is an elected member of the American Law Institute, as well as the Summit Council, and an invited member of the American Bar Foundation. She also serves on the Board of Advisors of the RAND Kenneth R. Feinberg Center for Catastrophic Risk Management and Compensation. She is an active member of the American Association for Justice (past chair of its Toxic, Environmental, and Pharmaceutical Torts section); the New Jersey Trial Lawyers Association, where she serves on the Board of Governors and is co-chair of its Mass Tort Committee; and the New Jersey and New York Bar Associations, and the American Bar Association. She is also former President of the Roscoe Pound Civil Justice Institute, now known as the National Civil Justice Institute. She is a frequent lecturer nationally at continuing legal education programs.
She has published law review articles in the Cardozo Law Review and the Dickinson Journal of Environmental Law and Policy; the chapter on Failure to Warn in Pharmaceutical and Medical Device Mass Tort Litigation in the treatise New Jersey Mass Torts and Class Action published by the New Jersey Institute for Continuing Legal Education; and numerous other legal publications.
She has been consistently named as a ”Super Lawyer” in both New York and New Jersey for the past several years, “Best Lawyer” in New York, and has been AV rated by Martindale Hubble for more than two decades.
Ellen Relkin can be reached directly by email at [email protected] and by phone at (212) 558-5715.
You may be entitled to legal compensation. We would be honored to represent you.
