Angela Cantrell v. Coloplast Corp., No. 22-2731 (8th Cir. 2023)
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Coloplast Corporation and Coloplast Manufacturing US, LLC (collectively, Coloplast) manufacture and market Restorelle L, a surgical mesh device. Plaintiff sued Coloplast for injuries allegedly caused by the implantation of Restorelle L mesh. After excluding portions of Plaintiff’s expert opinions and testimony, the district court granted summary judgment in favor of Coloplast. On appeal, Plaintiff argued that the district court erred in excluding her expert’s opinion on specific causation and in granting summary judgment on her negligent design claim.
The Eighth Circuit affirmed. The court concluded that the expert’s supplemental declaration was untimely because it was submitted after the deadlines for disclosure of expert reports and completion of all discovery. The court reasoned that Rule 26(e)(2) requires that an expert’s supplement “be disclosed by the time the party’s pretrial disclosures under Rule 26(a)(3) are due.” Rule 26(a)(3)(B), in turn, states that “Unless the court orders otherwise, these disclosures must be made at least 30 days before trial.” Plaintiff maintains that she, therefore, had until thirty days before trial to disclose the expert’s supplemental declaration. However, the court explained that she ignored the caveat that Rule 26’s default timing provision applies only if the court does not order otherwise. Here, the court set deadlines in its scheduling order, those deadlines superseded the default rules, and Plaintiff failed to meet those deadlines. Further, the court wrote that the district court also did not abuse its discretion when it decided to exclude the expert’s report and declaration without considering lesser sanctions.
Court Description: [Wollman, Author, with Colloton and Benton, Circuit Judges] Civil case - Products liability. Plaintiff alleged she was injured by the implantation of defendant's surgical mesh device; the district court excluded plaintiff's expert opinions and testimony under Rule 26(a)(2)(B)(ii) and then granted defendant's motion for summary judgment. Plaintiff appeals. The district court did not err in finding the expert witness's supplemental declaration was untimely under the court's scheduling order, and the court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to consider the supplemental declaration; the court did not err when it decided to exclude the expert witness report and declaration without considering lesser sanctions; in the absence of admissible evidence establishing causation, plaintiff could not establish an essential element of her case, and the district court did not err in granting defendant summary judgment.
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