Widow of Chicago Lawyer Who Died Days After Starting Generic Paxil Wins $3 Million Verdict Against GSK, Later Reversed on Preemption

Stewart Dolin was 57 and co-chair of the corporate and securities practice at the law firm Reed Smith in Chicago when his doctor prescribed Paxil in July 2010 for depression and anxiety. The pharmacy filled the prescription with generic paroxetine made by Mylan. Six days later, on July 15, 2010, he stepped in front of a CTA Blue Line train near the Washington station in downtown Chicago. Blood tests showed paroxetine in his system.

His widow, Wendy Dolin, sued GlaxoSmithKline and Mylan in Illinois state court, and GSK removed the case to federal court in Chicago. Mylan was dismissed early on federal preemption grounds under PLIVA v. Mensing, because a generic maker cannot change its label. The case against GSK rested on a different theory: GSK, as the brand manufacturer, controlled the paroxetine label under federal law, and that label warned of an increased suicide risk only for patients under 25. Wendy Dolin alleged that GSK's own clinical trial data showed an elevated suicide risk in adults of all ages and that the company had known it for years.

Judge James Zagel denied summary judgment, and the case was reassigned to Judge William T. Hart for trial. Trial ran from March 14 to April 20, 2017. The plaintiff's trial team, as reported by CBS Chicago at the verdict, was Michael Baum and Brent Wisner of Baum, Hedlund, Aristei & Goldman with David Rapoport of Rapoport Law Offices; the Seventh Circuit's counsel block lists Rapoport, Matthew Sims and Robert Brent Wisner. On April 20, 2017, the jury found GSK negligent and awarded $3 million: $2 million to Wendy Dolin for her loss and $1 million for her husband's suffering. Judge Hart denied GSK's motions for judgment as a matter of law and a new trial on September 14, 2017.

GSK appealed. On August 22, 2018, the Seventh Circuit reversed in an opinion by Judge David Hamilton, joined by Chief Judge Wood and Judge Sykes (Dolin v. GlaxoSmithKline LLC, No. 17-3030). The court did not reach GSK's argument that a brand manufacturer owes no duty to a patient who took a generic. It held instead that the failure-to-warn claim was preempted under Wyeth v. Levine because GSK had asked the FDA in 2006 to add a paroxetine-specific adult suicide warning, the agency had ordered it removed in 2007 in favor of a class-wide antidepressant warning, and the plaintiff offered no new safety information after 2007 that would have allowed GSK to change the label unilaterally. The judgment was reversed and the case ordered dismissed. The U.S. Supreme Court denied Wendy Dolin's petition for certiorari on May 28, 2019.

After the Supreme Court decided Merck v. Albrecht in 2019, clarifying that preemption is a question for the judge and requires clear evidence the FDA would have rejected the warning, Wendy Dolin moved for relief from the judgment under Rule 60(b). The district court denied the motion, and on March 6, 2020, the Seventh Circuit affirmed, holding that Albrecht clarified rather than changed the law. The $3 million verdict never became a collectable judgment. The case remains one of the few adult-suicide antidepressant claims to reach a jury and win, and its reversal is widely cited in preemption litigation.