Michael R. Klatt is a partner whose practice focuses on product liability and commercial litigation involving individual claims, mass tort/mass claims, and class actions in the fields of drugs and medical devices, products liability, and environmental/chemical exposures.
Mr. Klatt has decades of experience and specific expertise in the development of medical and scientific defenses to claims involving prescription and non-prescription pharmaceuticals, medical devices, cosmetic products, household products, and alleged chemical or environmental exposures.
For over 30 years, he has developed and led defense strategies based on sound principles of medicine and science on behalf of national manufacturers of these products in significant statewide and national litigations.
His experience also has included matters involving construction products, food contamination, and insecticides and pesticides, as well as commercial disputes. Mr. Klatt has frequently lectured at CLE events and taught law students at the University of Texas and Baylor University law schools regarding product liability and expert witness issues.
Before entering private law practice, he served as a briefing attorney for Judge Bob Shannon on the Court of Appeals for the Third Supreme Judicial District of Texas. Before attending law school, he taught high school social studies in Texas public high schools.
EXPERIENCE :
- Prescription medications and birth defects
- Chemical exposures and birth defects
- Prescription hormone replacement therapy drugs and breast and ovarian cancers
- A major prescription anti-depressant medication and suicidal behavior
- A leading anti-seizure medication and dermatological effects, including Stevens-Johnson syndrome
- A prescription implantable hormonal contraceptive and allegations of over-marketing and excessive routine hormonal side effects.
He has also been lead coordinating and trial counsel in the defense of product liability, negligence, warranty, and deceptive trade practice causes of action in other individual cases across the country regarding FDA-approved vaccines, prescription and over-the-counter medications, and medical devices.
During closing argument in one recent trial, a co-defendant’s counsel told the jury that during cross-examination of opposing experts, Mr. Klatt “had a knack for coming up with the right questions.” His experience in other cases also includes :
- Leading the defense team for a national agricultural insecticide manufacturer that defeated both national and statewide certification of a class of farmers alleging that chemical exposure to insecticides caused agricultural damage.
- Defense of a major chemical manufacturer against claims that its products caused various cancers in employees and residents who lived near its manufacturing plant.
- Defense of a major cosmetic manufacturer in a case alleging chemical burns due to a perfume product.
- Representation of one of the country’s largest veterinary products manufacturers in claims that vaccines resulted in widespread losses to cattle herds.
EDUCATION :
- J.D., Baylor Law School, 1980
- B.A., with highest honors, University of Texas at Austin, 1977
Admissions :
- State Bar of Texas
- U.S. District Court, Northern, Southern, Eastern and Western Districts of Texas
- U.S. Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit
Memberships :
- International Association of Defense Counsel
- Defense Research Institute
Cost
Rate : $$$