In one corner is Chris Seeger, a former boxer, who lost the first trial before New Jersey state court Judge Carol Higbee in the fall of 2005. His opponent is the scrappy Diane Sullivan of Dechert, whose pushy tactics prompted an unusually harsh rebuke from Higbee in front of an astonished courtroom.

But Higbee late last year overturned the verdict, which found that Merck couldn’t be held responsible for a heart attack suffered by Mike Humeston, an Idaho postal worker.

Another lawsuit, brought by the family of a Wisconsin accountant who suffered a fatal heart attack while taking Vioxx, will get under way simultaneously and pressed by Mark Lanier, the renowned Texas lawyer, a showman who loves to needle Merck every chance he gets.

In the scheme of things, this may be just another Vioxx trial, instead of a significant episode - Higbee hoped to hold four trials at once, but scheduling problems caused a last-minute snafu. With 15,000 lawsuits in NJ, this may not yield any clues about where the litigation is headed.

But it could be fun to watch. [tags]Carol Higbee, Mark Lanier, Merck, Vioxx[/tags]