Nicholas V. Janizeh
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Nick Janizeh focuses his practice on the defense of major pharmaceutical and medical device companies in state, federal, and multi-district litigation across the country.
Nick counsels clients on all aspects of product liability defense and has experience working up cases through all phases of litigation – from initial pleading challenges and discovery to trial.
A California native, Nick took a brief sojourn back east to earn a Master of Arts in Human Rights from Columbia University. While in New York, he also worked at the Clinton Foundation and Amnesty International. Nick returned home to Southern California to attend law school at USC, where he was a teaching assistant for the 1L Legal Writing Program and interned with a public interest law firm focused on mental health advocacy.
Outside of the law, Nick enjoys reading and sampling new restaurants in the Los Angeles area.
- Education
- University of Southern California, Gould School of Law (J.D., 2015); Southern California Law Review, Senior Editor; Legal Writing Fellow
- Columbia University (M.A., 2011)
- University of California, Berkeley (B.A., with honors, 2008)
- State Admissions
- California, 2015
- Federal Admissions
- United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit
- United States District Court, Central District of California
- United States District Court, Eastern District of California
- United States District Court, Northern District of California
- United States District Court, Southern District of California
- Service Areas
- Life Sciences Litigation
- Health & Life Sciences
- Member of national counsel team for manufacturer of prescription diabetes medication in multi-district litigation; involved in MDL formation, briefing before JPML and MDL courts, case work-up (specifically, developing product and company story and themes), company witness preparation, expert identification, and discovery disputes
- Successfully opposed Daubert challenge and secured favorable ruling to keep in general-causation expert testimony in multi-district products liability litigation involving implantable medical device
- Successfully opposed motion to compel discovery regarding recall of surgical stapler used during plaintiff’s lung transplant surgery
- Assisted trial team with first California talcum powder case wherein plaintiff alleged defendant’s talc-based products caused ovarian cancer; after trial, the Court entered judgment notwithstanding the jury verdict for defendant and, in the alternative, granted defendant’s motion for a new trial
Speaking Engagements
- “If You Build It, Plaintiffs Will Come: A Guide to Weeding Out Unmeritorious Claims from Mass Coordinated Product Liability Proceedings,” DRI’s Class Actions and Multi-Party Litigation Specialized Litigation Group webinar (November 2017)
Publications
- Science Basics for the Drug and Medical Device Lawyer, DRI, Editor (2020)
- “Punitive Damages – Which State’s Law Applies?“, DRI’s For The Defense (September 2018)
- “Innovator Liability: A Pandora’s Box for Pharma Cos.?“, Law360 (April 2018)
- “Putting the ‘Specific’ Back in Specific Jurisdiction: The Importance of Claim-by-Claim Jurisdictional Analysis in a Post-BMS Landscape,” Drug & Device Law Blog (January 2018)
- “Trejo v. Johnson & Johnson: The Death of Design Defect in California?“, DRI’s The Voice (August 2017)
- “If You Build It, Plaintiffs Will Come: A Guide to Weeding Out Unmeritorious Claims in Mass Coordinated Product Liability Proceedings,” DRI’s RX for the Defense (June 2017)
- Best Lawyers: Ones to Watch® in America (2024, 2025)
- American Bar Association
