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OxyContin maker said to be brokering plea deal in criminal probe:
Purdue Pharma LP, the OxyContin maker controlled by members of the wealthy Sackler family, is nearing an agreement to plead guilty to criminal charges as part of a broader deal to resolve United States Justice Department probes into its alleged role in fuelling the nation's opioid crisis, six people familiar with the matter said.
Purdue lawyers and federal prosecutors are brokering a plea deal that could be unveiled as quickly as within the next two weeks and include billions of dollars of financial penalties, four of the people said. They stressed that talks are fluid and that some of the terms could change as discussions continue.
In addition to the criminal case, US prosecutors are negotiating a settlement of civil claims also carrying a financial penalty that allege unlawful conduct in Purdue's handling of prescription painkillers, they said.
The Stamford, Connecticut-based company is expected to face penalties exceeding $8bn. They consist of a roughly $3.54bn criminal fine, $2bn criminal forfeiture and $2.8bn civil penalty, some of the people familiar with the negotiations said.
They are unlikely to be paid in the near term as the criminal fine and civil penalty are expected to be considered alongside other claims in Purdue's bankruptcy proceedings and the company lacks the necessary funds to fully repay all creditors.
The tentative agreement would draw a line under Purdue's criminal exposure for what prosecutors and state attorneys general have described as aggressive marketing of a highly-addictive painkiller that minimised the drug's potential for abuse and overdosing.
[...] The outcome of settlement talks among Purdue, its owners and litigants will help determine how much money US communities receive to address the toll from opioids.
In earlier filings made as part of Purdue's bankruptcy case, federal prosecutors alleged the company at times paid doctors and pharmacies illegal kickbacks between 2010 and 2018 to encourage medically unnecessary opioid prescriptions, resulting in fraudulent claims to government healthcare programmes such as Medicare.
Purdue has offered to settle widespread litigation in a deal it values at more than $10bn, much of it linked to drugs under development to treat addiction and combat overdoses. One contentious aspect of the proposal is that some of the funds would come from continued OxyContin sales.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 09 2020, @03:06PM
TBH, I'm not a support of the death penalty, but this is a case where they need to be executed. The number of people that they killed with theri recklessness and irresponsibiltiy really demands that they be executed. Even a long jail sentence is unlikely to prevent other executives from engaging in the same sort of behavior.
In practice, they'll likely get off with some sort of monetary fine and community service. If they do see jail at all, it will be a short sentence in a minimum security prison where the few white collar criminals that are sent to prison go.