The High Court has set aside the renewal of a personal injuries summons brought by Geraldine Galvin over a DePuy metal-on-metal hip implant, despite finding that she had been blameless throughout a lengthy sequence of solicitor failures.
In a judgment delivered on 4 December 2025, Mr Justice Cian Ferriter ruled that the summons, originally issued in January 2015 and renewed in April 2024, could not remain in force.
Galvin underwent hip replacement surgery in May 2005 using a DePuy ASR XL implant. The device was later subject to a global recall, and she underwent revision surgery in January 2012. Her claim against DePuy International alleged negligence and breach of the Liability for Defective Products Act 1991.
The original summons expired in January 2016 without ever being served. The court found that Galvin's first solicitor had actively misled her, including by falsely suggesting that proceedings were progressing and that DePuy had served a notice for particulars.
Galvin changed solicitors in 2019. The fact that the summons had never been served was not discovered until June 2020, after prolonged difficulties obtaining her file.
Mr Justice Ferriter held that the first solicitor's conduct was so unusual and serious that it amounted to special circumstances explaining the period up to June 2020.
However, the judge found that the position changed once non-service was discovered. Although Galvin's second solicitor faced genuine difficulties and considered settlement and potential negligence proceedings, no application to renew the summons was brought within a reasonable period. Correspondence showed that by November 2020 the need for a renewal application was understood, and by May 2021 advice had apparently been received that such an application would fail.
The court held that no sufficient special circumstances explained at least a substantial part of the following two-and-a-half years before the file reached Galvin's third solicitor in March 2023.
Because that threshold requirement was not met, the court could not move on to balance the wider interests of justice. The April 2024 renewal order was therefore set aside.