NEWARK, New Jersey (AP) — A federal judge in New Jersey has dismissed a securities class action lawsuit brought against Merck & Co. by investors over its one-time blockbuster drug Vioxx because the statute of limitations has run out.Shares of Merck soared to their highest price in three and a half years. The stock rose more than 9 percent, or $4.28 to $50.65 on the New York Stock Exchange.

Investors had charged Merck with providing misleading information or omitted details that Vioxx, its pain reliever, increased the risk of heart disease. They claim that the shares they purchased were thus inflated because they didn’t properly reflect the heart risks.

But Judge Stanley R. Chester of the US District Court in Newark said in a ruling on Thursday that “the court finds that it is clear that storm warnings of fraud by the company existed more than two years before this complaint was filed”.

Sarbanes-Oxley, the corporate governance law enacted in July 2002, set a deadline of two years for securities fraud claims after the discovery of the facts or five years after the violation, whichever is earlier.

In his opinion, Judge Chester wrote that the clock started ticking on September 21, 2001, the date a warning letter from the US Food and Drug Administration to Merck was published on its web-site. The FDA had admonished Merck for downplaying the risks of Vioxx.

The plaintiffs, who were investors who had bought Merck stock from May 21, 1999 through October 29, 2004, filed the class-action lawsuit on November 6, 2003.

“The judge agreed with our arguments on the statute of limitations and the claimants are time-barred,” said Kent Jarrell, a spokesman for Merck’s outside counsel.