STANLEY P. BAUDIN v. ASTRAZENECA PHARMACEUTICALS LP; ASTRAZENECA LP; AND MERCK SHARP & DOHME CORPORATION
NO. 18-1063
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT MIDDLE DISTRICT OF LOUISIANA
August 26, 2019
JUDGE
RULING
This matter is before the Court on the Motion to Dismiss1 by Defendants, AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals LP, AstraZeneca LP, and Merck Sharp & Dohme Corporation (“Defendants”). Plaintiff, Stanley P. Baudin (“Plaintiff”), has filed an Opposition2 to which Defendants replied.3 Oral argument is not necessary. For the following reasons, the Court finds that Defendants’ motion should granted in part, denied in part, and Plaintiff will be allowed to amend his Complaint within 30 days to cure the deficiencies as to his state law claims.
I. FACTUAL BACKGROUND
Plaintiff brings this lawsuit after suffering from gastric cancer and severe personal injuries and other damages allegedly as a result of taking the prescription drug Nexium.4 Defendants are the alleged designers, researchers, manufacturers, testers, advertisers, promoters, marketers, sellers, and distributers of Nexium.5 Generally, Plaintiff claim that Defendants negligently reрresented that Nexium was tested and found to be safe and effective for treating peptic disorders. Defendants allegedly knew and concealed that Nexium was defective as it allegedly causes gastric cancer.6 Plaintiff alleges in abundant detail: the genesis of Nexium;7 what it is prescribed for;8 the difference between “PPI’s”, including Nexium, and “H2 antagonists”;9 the stomach and digestive system;10 the physiology of gastric acid and gastrin;11 how PPI’s affect the stomach and digestive system and cause gastric cancer;12 what gastric cancer is;13 the epidemiology between PPI’s and gastric cancer;14 the scientific studies supporting these allegations;15 and how Defendants allegedly concealed this information to manufacture, market, and sell Nexium as a
Plaintiff originally instituted this suit in the 19th Judicial District Court, Parish of East Baton Rouge, State of Louisiana, which was removed to this Court based on diversity jurisdiction.17 Plaintiff asserts state law claims of fraud, negligent misrepresentation, and redhibition based on nоn-economic losses. Plaintiff also asserts claims under the Louisiana Products Liability Act (“LPLA”), and asserts a redhibition claim under Louisiana law for economic losses.18 This Court has jurisdiction over this matter pursuant to
II. LAW AND ANALYSIS
A. Motion to Dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6)
When deciding a
The LPLA establishes the exclusive theory of liability for manufacturers regarding damages caused by their products. The applicable standard under the LPLA is as follows: “The manufacturer of a product shall be liable to a claimant for damage proximately caused by a characteristic of the product that renders the product unreasonably dangerous when such damage arose from a reasonably anticipated use of the product by the claimant or another person or entity.”28 Thus, to maintain a successful claim under the LPLA, a claimant must establish four elements: (1) that the defendant is a manufacturer of the product; (2) that the claimant’s damage was proximately caused by a characteristic of the product; (3) that this characteristic made the product “unreasonably dangerous”; and (4) that the claimant’s damage arose from a reasonably anticipated use of the product by the claimant or someone else.29
A product is “unreasonably dangerous” under the LPLA in one of four ways: (1) construction or composition; (2) design; (3) inadequate warning; or (4) failure to conform to an express warranty.30 The “unreasonably dangerous” characteristic must exist at the time the product left the manufacturer’s control or result from a reasonably anticipated modification or alteration of the product.31 An unreasonably dangerous condition cannot be presumed solely from the fact that injury occurred.32 Rather, the claimant has the burden of proving the required elements under the LPLA.33
1. The LPLA is Exclusive
As an initial matter, Defendants correctly argue that all of the non-LPLA claims against it for fraud, negligent misrepresentation, and redhibition based on non-economic losses must be dismissed.34 The LPLA establishes the exclusive theory of liability for manufacturers for damages caused by their products.35 “A claimant may not recover from a manufacturer for damage caused by a product on the basis of any theory of liability that is not set forth in” the LPLA.36 Plaintiff concedes this point and “requests leave to amend his Complaint to remove such references to barred claims”.37 Therefore, any claims of state law for fraud,38 negligent misrepresentation, and redhibition based on non-economic losses are improper and are dismissed with prejudice. The Plaintiff’s
2. Sufficiency of Pleading Claims under the LPLA
Defendants argue that Plaintiff fails to plead a viable LPLA claim with sufficient specificity to state a claim upon which relief may be granted.39 Plaintiff contends that the Complaint “contains the requisite factual allegations to state viable claims under the LPLA, including claims for (a) design defect; (b) failure to warn; (c) breach of warranty; and (d) redhibition”.40 The Court considers Plaintiff’s pleading of each of these claims under the LPLA.
a. Design Defect
Under
This test requires a plaintiff to prove both “that an alternative design existed” at the time the product was manufactured and “that the risk avoided by using the alternative design (magnitude of damage discounted by the likelihood of its occurrence) would have exceeded the burden of switching to the alternative design (added construction costs and loss of product utility).”41 The occurrence of an injury does not give rise to the presumption that the design was unreasonably dangerous.42 A conclusory allegation that an alternate design exists will not suffice, but the plaintiff need not allege in detail “that the product’s design would cause the claimant’s damage,” that “the gravity of that damage outweighed the burden on the manufacturer of adopting such alternative design,” and “the adverse effect, if any, of such alternative design on the utility of the produсt.”43
Plaintiff’s complaint alleges that “alternative safer methods” existed for treating his peptic disorder “that provided the same benefits but acted through a different mechanism and were not associated with stomach cancer”.44 Plaintiff contends that one “safer alternative” is “the class of drugs collectively known as the H2 antagonists, also called H2 blockers”, which includes Tagamet, Tagamet HB, Pepcid, Pepcid AC, Axid, and Zantac.45 Plaintiff specifically alleges that Defendants are liable for defects in the design of its medication.46 Plaintiff pleads its “First Claim for Relief” as a “design defect” claim “under
Defendants contend that Plaintiff’s allegations fail to state a claim for design defect because Plaintiff relied on “nothing more than statutory buzz words” which are “clearly legal conclusions” that are within the “sole province of the trier of fact”.49 Further, Defendants argue that Plaintiff’s allegations “fail to explain how any particular Defendant’s [sic] specific product was allegedly defective or what attributes of each Defendant’s product [sic] made it unreasonably dangerous”.50 Defendants argue that Plaintiff fails to adequately plead the alternative design and that “merely referencing other products is not sufficient to estаblish an alternative design”.51 Similarly, Defendants argue that Plaintiff makes purely conclusory allegations that the gravity of the harm outweighed the burden of adopting an alternative design.52
In opposition, Plaintiff argues that his Complaint is “replete with factual allegations that explain the action mechanism of Nexium upon ingestion, and how that process modifies certain cells in the stomach over time which results in a significantly increased risk in the development of stomach cancer”.53 Indeed, the Complaint reflects detailed factual allegations of the evolution of Nexium and the conditions it was designed to treat;54 an explanation of “the stomach and digestion”;55 an explanation of the balance between “gastric acidity and gastrin”;56 identifies Nexium as a proton pump inhibitor or PPI; a description of what PPI’s are;57 general background of gastric cancer;58 the purported relationship of PPI’s and gastric cancer;59 the studies purporting to support a link between the use of PPI’s and gastric cancer;60 and the alleged link between Defendants, their product, and gastric cancer.61
Here, Plaintiff has alleged an alternative design existed that would not have caused his injury, gastric cancer.62 Plaintiff alleges that “other medications”, such as Axid, Pepcid, Pepcid AC, Tagamet, and Tagamet HB, otherwise known as “H2 receptor antagonists”, have lower risks, are “safer” than Nexium or PPI’s, are prescribed for the same conditions as PPI’s, and have not been associated with gastric cancer.63
This Court has found that a complaint sufficiently pleads a design defect claim by alleging an alternative design in general terms, including the general characteristics of the alternative design. See, Boutte v. Stryker Biotech, LLC, 67 F.Supp.3d 732, 736-37 (M.D. La. Dec. 22, 2014),67 where this Court denied a motion to dismiss where the alleged alternative design was to promote the pharmaceutical as approved by the FDA and to not permit its combination with other specific pharmaceuticals; Crochet v. Bristol-Myers Squibb, 2016 WL 3580670, *3 (M.D. La. June 28, 2016),68 where this Court found the plaintiff’s allegation that the defendants “failed to consider the design of other available drugs that could treat [plaintiff’s] condition that did not have, or had a much lower incidence and risk of developing [the subject side effect] following treatment” sufficient to state a design defect claim; and Brooks v. Amgen, Inc., 2019 WL 507491, *5 (M.D. La. Feb. 8, 2019),69 where the Court acknowledged the “barebones” allegations of the complaint but found that the plaintiff “at least implicitly plead an alternative design – Prolia or any other medication for osteoporosis that does not cause jaw necrosis” as sufficient to deny a motion to dismiss. On the other hand, this Court has found a failure to state a claim of defeсtive design when there are no allegations of alternative design or of any weighing of the likelihood and gravity of damages against the burden of adopting alternative designs.70 Such is not the case here.
Further, this Court is mindful of its findings in Lahaye v. AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals, 2015 WL 1935947 (M.D. La. Apr. 28, 2015),71 an LPLA case regarding the same prescription drug at issue in this matter, Nexium. In Lahaye, this Court found that the plaintiff “at least implicitly pled an alternative design – a medication that would not cause C. diff or lead the
Both parties address the second element of the design defect claim in a cursory fashion – the likelihood that the design of prescription Nexium would cause the harm complained of or that the gravity of that harm outweighed the burden of adopting the alternative design. Defendants simply argue that Plaintiff’s allegations are conclusory and his claims should be denied.74 Plaintiff, citing to his Complaint and the pages of allegations regarding the scientific support for the link between Nexium and gastric cancer and the lack of scientific support for the link between the alternative pharmaceuticals and gastric cancer, argues that the likelihood that the design of Nexium could cause gastric cancer “was great” and has been known “since the 1980s”, and the gravity of developing gastric cancer “clearly outweighed the burden” to the Defendants of utilizing the alternate design found in the H2 receptor antagonist pharmaceuticals.75 As cited above, the Complaint reflects detailed pages of allegations of the relationship between PPI’s and gastric cancer, unarguably a grave harm. The Complaint sufficiently alleges that the risk of gastric cancer outweighs the burden of utilizing alternative H2 receptor antagonist pharmaceuticals in lieu of PPI’s.76
Considering the Complaint, the arguments of the parties, and the jurisprudence, the Court finds the Complaint plausibly states a design defect claim under the LPLA. The Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss Plaintiff’s design defect claim is DENIED.
b. Failure to Warn
To maintain a failure to warn claim under the LPLA, “a plaintiff must demonstrate that the product in question has a potentially damage-causing characteristic and that the manufacturer failed to use reasonable care to provide an adequate warning about this characteristic.”77 The manufacturer is liable for an inadequate warning only if the defect proximately caused the plaintiff’s injury.78 The plaintiff bears the burden of proving that “but for” the inadequate warning, the accident in question would not have occurred.79
In failure to warn cases, the law not only requires manufacturers to provide an adequate warning at the time the product left its control, if such warning is necessary to apprise ordinary consumers of
Plaintiff’s “Second Claim for Relief” is a claim of “inadequate warning under
Defendants argue that Plaintiff’s Complaint fails to state a claim for failure to warn because the allegations are conclusory аnd, thus, insufficient.93 Specifically, Defendants argue that Plaintiff does not provide the warning or the name of his physician.94 Defendants’ argument focuses mainly on the element of causation. Defendants argue that Plaintiff must show that
In response, Plaintiff argues that the Complaint “specifically cited to language from Defendants’ product insert for Nexium which failed to provide Plaintiff’s physicians (and all physicians) with adequate risk information for the development or promotion of gastric cancer from Nexium use”.95 Plaintiff further argues that by alleging that “Plaintiff’s prescribing physicians of Nexium”, he sufficiently identified which physicians were not warned.96 Further, Plaintiff argues, citing to Lahaye v. AstraZeneca Pharm., LP, that the failure to identify a physician by name is not dispositive of this issue.97 Finally, Plaintiff argues that it is premature to determine the learned intermediary issue at this stage of the litigation, and Plaintiff’s allegations should be accepted as true.98
The Court finds that the Plaintiff’s allegations plausibly state a failure to warn claim. Plaintiff pleads in his Complaint:
126.
To date, Defendants’ prescription Nexium lacks adequate risk information for stomach adenocarcinomas, despite science stating otherwise. The June 2018 product insert for Nexium merely advises prescribers (and patients) that ‘… the symptomatic response to therapy does not preclude the presence of gastric malignancy. Consider additional follow-up and diagnostic testing in adult patients who have suboptimal response or an early symptomatic relapse after completing treatment with a PPI. In older patients also consider an endoscopy.’ In other words, symptom relief could cloud a ‘pre-existing malignancy’. No language exists which warns the prescribers and patients of the epidemiological and biological evidence linking the long-term use of PPIs and the development of gastric cancer.
127.
In addition, the June 2018 ‘HIGHLIGHTS OF PRESCRIBING INFORMATION’ product insert adds, ‘Interactions with Diagnostic Investigations for Neuroendocrine Tumors: Increased chromogranin A (CgA) levels may interfere with diagnostic investigations for neuroendocrine tumors, temporarily stop NEXIUM at least 14 days before assessing CgA levels.’99
The Court notes that the argument before the Court on Defendants’
The Court now turns to Defendants’ argument that Plaintiff does not sufficiently identify the physicians who prescribed Nexium to Plaintiff. Defendants are correct that the Complaint does not reflect the name of Plaintiff’s physicians. Plaintiff makes general references to his physicians,100 prescribing health care professionals,101 and prescribers.102 However,
Defendants’ final and dominant argument is that Plaintiff has not sufficiently plead causation. The Court notes that the primary case upon which Defendants rely in their motion is Jenkins v. Bristol-Myers Squibb.104 In this case, the defendants moved to dismiss the plaintiff’s failure to warn claim on the same grounds and making the same argument as Defendants advance here. The Jenkins court denied the defendants’ motion and found that the plaintiff sufficiently plead the second element of the learned intermediary doctrine. In Jenkins, the plaintiff alleged: “If defendants had properly warned of the severity of Tardive Dyskinesia, of the importance of properly monitoring patients using Abilify to prevent the onset of Tardive Dyskinеsia, and informed health care providers of what periodic monitoring tests were necessary, Plaintiff would not have contracted Tardive Dyskinesia.”105 In rejecting the Jenkins defendants’ arguments on this issue and finding that the quoted allegation was sufficient, the Jenkins court stated:
To allege a failure-to-warn claim upon which relief can be granted under the LPLA, Plaintiff is not required to detail what an adequate warning would be and how an adequate warning would have caused Plaintiff’s treating physician to act differently. Plaintiff is merely required to allege that Defendants did not adequately warn Plaintiff’s treating physician and that the inadequate warning constituted the proximate warning [or cause] of Plaintiff’s injuries.106
Here, Plaintiff’s allegations are much more detailed than that in Jenkins. Plaintiff alleges what the current warning states and alleges what the proper warning should contain or how the current warning is inadequate.107 Plaintiff also specifically alleges that had Defendants issued an adequate warning, Plaintiff’s physicians could have discussed the risks with Plaintiff and/or would not have prescribed it and that Plaintiff would not have taken the Nexium.108 Plaintiff explicitly alleges that Plaintiff’s physician would have acted differently with a proper warning. The Court finds that Plaintiff has sufficiently alleged that Defendants did not adequately warn Plaintiff and his treating physicians and that the allegedly inadequate warning constituted the proximate cause of Plaintiff’s injuries. Thus, the Court denies Defendants’ motion to dismiss Plaintiff’s failure to warn claim.
c. Breach of Express Warranty
To state a viable claim that a product is “unreasonably dangerous beсause of nonconformity to express warranty,” a plaintiff must demonstrate that (1) an express warranty existed, (2) he or she was induced to purchase the product due to the warranty, and (3) his or her damage was
Plaintiff alleges that Defendants “expressly warranted that Nexium was safe and well accepted by users”.110 Plaintiff and his physicians “relied on Defendants’ express warranties” and the express warranties “were a part of the basis for Plaintiff’s and Plaintiff’s physicians use of Nexium and he relied upon these warranties in deciding to use Nexium”.111 Plaintiff avers that Defendants breached the express warranties because Nexium “was and is defective and causes harm and injury”.112 Specifically, Plaintiff alleges that as a “direct and proximate result of thе breach of these warranties, Plaintiff suffered and will continue to suffer severe and permanent personal injuries, disfigurement, losses, and damages”.113 Plaintiff continues with allegations that Defendants had knowledge of the purpose of Nexium and warranted it to be safe, effective, and proper for such use.114 Defendants allegedly warranted that Nexium was “safe and fit for use for the purposes intended”, “of merchantable quality”, “did not produce any dangerous side effects”, “that side effects were accurately reflected in the warnings” and that this was “false and misleading”.115
Defendants’ arguments in support of dismissing Plaintiff’s breach of express warranty claim mirror those advanced in support of dismissing Plaintiff’s failure to warn claim: that the specific wаrranty was not alleged; that the allegations are “boilerplate” and conclusory; that Plaintiff does not identify the materials where the warranty appears; and that Plaintiff does not specify that the warranty prompted any particular physician to prescribe Nexium.116 In response, Plaintiff argues that his pleading was sufficient, citing to the specific paragraphs in the Complaint alleging the warranty, facts supporting the express warranty and alleged breach of same, the inducement to prescribe and use the product, and the cause of his damages.117
First, it is unnecessary for Plaintiff to cite to a specific express warranty.118 Even without the legal requirement to do so, Plaintiff alleges that the Defendant manufacturer еxpressly warranted Nexium as “safe”. Defendants rely upon Robertson v. AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals, LP,119 in which the plaintiff simply and generally plead that the defendant “expressly warranted that Seroquel is a safe, effective product that can be used for the treatment of depressive episodes of bipolar disorder” and that this warranty was located on “materials presented to the FDA”.120 The Robertson court found that “[w]hile Plaintiff is not required to quote the specific language of the warranties, she must make more than a general reference to them. The reference to ‘materials presented to the FDA’ is not specific enough to survive a
Further, the Court has not been provided with, nor is it aware of, binding or persuasive authority that the express warranty must appear in a certain location and/or that Plaintiff must specifically allege where the warranties appear. Defendants again rely on the same general, vague language from Robertson, as quoted above. The Court does not read the Robertson court’s finding that the reference to “materials presented to the FDA” as not being specific enough to require all plaintiffs to specifically allege where warranties appear. Plaintiff in this matter alleges a scheme of promoting Nexium as safe and effective while simultaneously having knowledge that Nexium has been allegedly associated with developing gastric cancer. Plaintiff alleges that Defendants represented to the medical community, prescribing physicians, and the public that Nexium was tested and safe and effective, despite alleged knowledge to the contrary. This pleading of a broad scheme is similar to that plead in Boutte v. Stryker Biotech, LLC.122 There, this Court stated, “[i]n fact, Boutte’s petition alleges what amounts to an ‘elaborate scheme’ by Styker to promote Calstrux as the ‘preferred’ and ‘perfect carrier for OP-1,’ and assuring the medical community that the combination was ‘safe and effective,’ while knowing that the combined use of the products remained untested, ineffective, and unsafe.”123
Considering Plaintiff’s allegations as true and in a light favorable to the Plaintiff, Plaintiff’s factual pleading of his breach of express warranty claim is sufficient and more in line with this Court’s findings in Boutte v. Stryker Biotech, LLC,124 than those of Robertson v. AstraZeneca.125 The Court denies Defendants’ motion with respect to the breach of express warranty claim.
C. Redhibition
Under Louisiana law, a buyer has a warranty “against redhibitory defects, or vices, in the thing sold. A defect is redhibitory when it renders the thing useless, or its use so inconvenient that it must be presumed that a buyer would not have bought the thing had he known of the defect.”126 Such a defect may give a buyer the right to obtain rescission of the sale, or, if the buyer would have still bought the product but for a lesser price, a reduction of the purchase price.127 If a seller is deemed to be in “bad faith,” a buyer can also recover damages and attorneys’ fees.128 The Louisiana Civil Code makes clear that recovery under a theory of redhibition
Bаsed on the foregoing as well as the established principle that the “LPLA subsumes all possible causes of action [against a manufacturer] with the exception of redhibition”,130 the Court turns to whether Plaintiff sufficiently plead a claim of redhibition and whether similar claims have been allowed to proceed beyond the
Defendants contend that the only exception to the LPLA’s exclusivity provision is a redhibition claim for damage to a product itself or economic loss.131 Defendants argue that Plaintiff failed to sufficiently state a claim of redhibition based on damage to a product or economic loss.132 Defendants summarized their argument regarding Plaintiff’s redhibition claim as, “the Petition fails to provide any factual information about the seller or how, as alleged, Nexium is useless for its intended purpose or so inconvenient as judged by the reasonable person standard. In fact, the allegations pled in the Petition suggest the contrary as Plaintiff claims to have used Nexium for 15 years, further suggesting that the product assisted Plaintiff. Likewise, the Petition fails to detail how the product is allegedly defective.”133
Plaintiff does not admit that he did not claim damage to a product, but he does not address his allegation for damage to a product in his Complaint. He argues that sufficiently plead the facts of a redhibition claim due to the defect in Nexium that causes gastric cancer and the fact he would not have used Nexium had he known of this defect.134 Plaintiff argues that he plead еconomic loss due to redhibition “in the form of a return of the purchase price he paid for Nexium, a return of insurance co-payments paid for Nexium, interest on these amounts from the dates of purchase, and attorneys’ fees and costs”.135
As set forth above, the Complaint alleges: detailed facts about the sellers of Nexium (all of the named Defendants);136 that scientific literature and studies support findings that Nexium, a PPI, causes or develops gastric cancer; that there is a correlation between the use of Nexium and the development of gastric cancer; that this information is known to Defendants; that the current warnings and/or warranties contained in the product literature do not state that a user of Nexium may dеvelop gastric cancer or that this has been found to occur in the past; and that had Plaintiff and his prescribing physicians known this, then Nexium would not have been used and/or prescribed.137 For the same reasons stated above, the Court finds that Plaintiff meets the
Also, a simple review of the Complaint reveals that Plaintiff seeks economic loss due to redhibition.138
In Harris v. Merck & Co., Inc.,139 Western District Court of Louisiana considered plaintiff’s products liability claims under the LPLA as well as a redhibition claim adverse to the pharmaceutical manufacturer. In a very brief address of plaintiff’s redhibition claim, the Harris court stated:
[T]he LPLA allows for a redhibition claim only to the extent that plaintiff seeks recovery of economic losses. Merck asserts that plaintiff’s redhibition claim must fail beсause plaintiff’s complaint fails, as argued above, to state a claim for defect. Having already deemed plaintiff’s complaint sufficient as stating a claim for design defect under the LPLA, we also reject this argument relating to redhibition and find that plaintiff’s redhibition claim should be preserved for further proceedings. Accordingly, Merck’s motion will be denied in this respect.140
A similar finding was made in Nelson v. Mylan Pharmaceuticals, Inc.,141 as well as by this Court in Boutte v. Stryker Biotech, LLC.142
Based on the allegations in the Complaint and the general challenges to Plaintiff’s redhibition claim, the Court finds that Plaintiff has plead enough facts to state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face. Plaintiff pleads not only the essential elements of a redhibition claim, but also seeks the appropriate relief of economic damages and рleads the factual content that allows the Court to draw the reasonable inference that the Defendants may be liable for the misconduct alleged. Further, district courts in Louisiana have similarly preserved redhibition claims for further proceedings, as set forth above. Therefore, the Court denies Defendants’ motion to dismiss Plaintiff’s redhibition claim.
D. Plaintiff’s Claims under Rule 8
Defendants argue that Plaintiff’s claims should be dismissed for the independent reason that Plaintiff fails to satisfy the requirements of
Overall, Defendants’ argument in support of their motion under
For the reasons stated above, the Court finds that the Complaint herein satisfies the liberal requirements of
III. CONCLUSION
For the reasons set forth above, the Motion to Dismiss146 by Defendants, AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals LP, AstraZeneca LP, and Merck Sharp & Dohme Corporation, is GRANTED IN PART as to the exclusivity of the Louisiana Products Liability Act. Plaintiff, Stanley P. Baudin, is granted leave of court to amend his Complaint within thirty (30) days of the date of this Ruling to cure the deficiencies as to his state law claims.
Defendants’ motion is DENIED IN PART in all other respects.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
Signed in Baton Rouge, Louisiana on August 26, 2019.
CHIEF JUDGE SHELLY D. DICK
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
MIDDLE DISTRICT OF LOUISIANA