For The Defense, October 2010 - DRI Today

As I complete my first year as the chairof DRI’s Drug and Medical DeviceCommittee, I welcome this chanceto look back on the last 12 months totake stock in what the committee hasaccomplished, and to encourage membersof the committee to take advantage,over the next 12 months, of theopportunities to participate in the work of the committee.I invite you to join your fellow outside and in-house counselcolleagues at the 27th Annual Drug and Medical DeviceSeminar in Chicago on May 4–5, 2011. The planning is completefor what will be another outstanding program. The hallmarkof our seminar, which places it in a category with nocontenders, is our ability to offer attendees the best trial lawyersin the country who represent drug and medical devicecompanies to demonstrate their trial skills. Even the mostexperienced trial lawyers will leave our seminar with newideas for how to convince a jury of the merit of their cases.Last May in San Francisco, the 26th annual seminar tookplace as a result of the hard work of many members of theplanning committee. I cannot overstate the dedication ofthese lawyers who spent hundreds of hours on weekly conferencecalls to make sure the seminar was up to the standardsset by those who preceded me as chair of the committee.I would like to recognize the following individuals for theirwork in planning the seminar. Scott Sayler of Shook Hardy& Bacon, as the committee’s vice-chair, worked closely withJim Rogers of Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough, our programchair, to sift through the ideas for programs and vetthe names of potential presenters. We were lucky to have thecounsel and guidance of William Ray of Watkins & Eager,who was the Law Institute’s liaison to our planning committee.Carter Thompson of Baker, Donelson, Bearman,Caldwell & Berkowitz, with the help of Gail Rodgers of DLAPiper, did a great job marketing the seminar. Sara Gourley ofSidley Austin and Mark “Rick” Richardson of GlaxoSmith-Kline spearheaded the efforts to convince companies of thebenefits of holding panel counsel meetings at the seminar.The result of the hard work of these people was a combinationof timely presentations of the law, trial skills demonstrations,outstanding networking opportunities at DRI sponsoredreceptions and receptions co- sponsored by many law firms.Lana Varney of Fulbright & Jaworski teamed up for thefirst program with experts in trial graphics and jury researchto talk about and show examples of trial graphics that reallywork in medical device and drug cases. Tamar Halpren ofPhillips Lytle, a well-known expert on developing the “sci-For The Defense n October 2010 n 13