A Medical Device Daily

Despite eight days of deliberations, jurors in the fraud trial of Richard Scrushy, founder and former CEO of HealthSouth (Birmingham, Alabama), told U.S. District Judge Karon Bowdre this week that they have not been able to reach a decision in the case and they asked to extend their workday one more hour than the 5-1/2 hour day they had previously been using.

The move came in response to Bowdre’s suggestion last week that they work a longer day in order to come to a decision in the case.

The apparent delay in reaching a final ruling may indicate that the jurors are having difficulty reaching a unanimous decision, either innocent or guilty.

The jurors are not sequestered and so commute each day, and some reportedly are continuing work at their regular jobs while hearing and deliberating the case.

In another high-profile case, New York State Supreme Court Justice Michael Obus on Tuesday postponed his instructions to the jury in the retrial of Dennis Kozlowski and Mark Swartz, former top executives of manufacturing conglomerate Tyco (Pembroke, Bermuda), parent of Tyco Healthcare (Mansfield, Massachusetts).

As a result of the decision, the jury was not expected to begin deliberations until today or tomorrow.

Kozlowski, former CEO, and Swartz, former CFO of the company, are accused of engineering the misuse of corporate funds for their own personal benefit, and also tax evasion.

In other legalities, the U.S. District Court in Delaware has issued an order in connection with the pending lawsuits by PHT (Charleston, Massachusetts) against CRF (Waltham, Massachusetts), etrials Worldwide (Morrisville, North Carolina) and invivodata (Charlestown, Massachusett), alleging infringement of U.S. patent No. 6,095,985. In its Markman decision, the court ruled on the meaning of the claim terms in the ’985 patent.

The companies in the case all compete in the electronic patient diary arena.

Philip Lee, president and CEO of PHT, said, “The court’s ruling was consistent with PHT’s positions on all of the major issues and is a significant step forward in our efforts to protect our valuable intellectual property.”

PHT is a provider of electronic patient reported outcome (ePRO) solutions, used, it reports, in more than 155 trials worldwide. These include, it says, “13 of the top 15 drug development firms in the world.”