Beleaguered drug maker Merck & Co.’s request to postpone the next trial over its withdrawn painkiller Vioxx was turned down Monday by the New Jersey judge presiding over the case.

Superior Court Judge Carol E. Higbee, who is overseeing nearly 2,500 Vioxx product liability cases that have been filed in New Jersey, also rejected two other Merck motions related to the upcoming trial.

Whitehouse Station, N.J.-based Merck, in a motion filed last week, had urged Higbee to postpone the trial’s start for 45 days, citing a “media blitz” after the first Vioxx trial. That ended Aug. 19 with an Angleton, Texas, jury awarding $253.4 million to the widow of Bob Ernst. He died in 2001 after taking Vioxx for eight months.

Set to start Sept. 12 in Atlantic City, the second trial over the drug involves a 60-year-old postal worker from Boise, Idaho.