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posted by Fnord666 on Thursday October 22 2020, @06:28AM   Printer-friendly
from the corporations-are-people-too dept.

OxyContin Maker Purdue Pharma to Plead Guilty to Three Criminal Charges

OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma to plead guilty to 3 criminal charges as part of an $8 billion-plus settlement

WASHINGTON (AP) — Purdue Pharma, the company that makes OxyContin, the powerful prescription painkiller that experts say helped touch off an epidemic, will plead guilty to three federal criminal charges as part of a settlement of more than $8 billion, Justice Department officials told The Associated Press.

The company will plead guilty to a criminal information being filed Wednesday in federal court in New Jersey to three counts, including conspiracy to defraud the United States and violating federal anti-kickback laws, the officials said.

The deal does not release any of the company's executives or owners — members of the wealthy Sackler family — from criminal liability. A criminal investigation is ongoing.

The officials were not authorized to discuss the investigation publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

Also at: Business Insider, CBS News, and ABC News.

Guilty pleas? You seldom see that - these corporates always seem to get away with weasel word statements to the effect, "We acknowledge no wrongdoing blah blah blah . . . "

Purdue Pharma Pleads Guilty to Opioid Crisis Charges, Will Become a Public Benefit Corporation

OxyContin maker to plead guilty to federal criminal charges, pay $8 billion, and will close the company

Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin, has agreed to plead guilty to three federal criminal charges for its role in creating the nation's opioid crisis and will pay more than $8 billion and close down the company.

The money will go to opioid treatment and abatement programs. The privately held company has agreed to pay a $3.5 billion fine as well as forfeit an additional $2 billion in past profits, in addition to the $2.8 billion it agreed to pay in civil liability.
"Purdue Pharma actively thwarted the United States' efforts to ensure compliance and prevent diversion," said Drug Enforcement Administration Assistant Administrator Tim McDermott. "The devastating ripple effect of Purdue's actions left lives lost and others addicted."

The company doesn't have $8 billion in cash available to pay the fines. So Purdue will be dissolved as part of the settlement, and its assets will be used to create a new "public benefit company" controlled by a trust or similar entity designed for the benefit of the American public. The Justice Department said it will function entirely in the public interest rather than to maximize profits. Its future earnings will go to paying the fines and penalties, which in turn will be used to combat the opioid crisis.

That new company will continue to produce painkillers such as OxyContin, as well as drugs to deal with opioid overdose. Deputy Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen, who announced the settlement, defended the plans for the new company to continue to sell that drug, saying there are legitimate uses for painkillers such as OxyContin.

Also at The New York Times, Bloomberg, NBC, and CBS.

Previously:


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  • (Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday October 22 2020, @08:00AM (29 children)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Thursday October 22 2020, @08:00AM (#1067440) Journal
    What's "curious" about the relationship of this story to its submitters? As noted, it is rare to see a guilty plea.

    I mean, nobody seems to worry about the steroid abusers, especially in high places! Or the escatsy users? Or the Pot Heads in Colorado, just a short few hours drive from Arkansas. . . Just saying.

    What large legal business has used its network of doctors to push steroids, ecstasy, or marijuana? There is no analogous situation with these other drugs.

  • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @09:32AM (5 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @09:32AM (#1067443)

    Another right wing druggie! Khallow! I am surprised that you show up? With you it is Vienna circle meth, is it not? Remember what the old time hippies used to say! "Speed kills, man!"

    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday October 22 2020, @11:08AM (4 children)

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Thursday October 22 2020, @11:08AM (#1067454) Journal
      Sad when you have nothing to say Ari, but have to say it anyway.
      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @11:18AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @11:18AM (#1067456)

        He is acting more like a wounded beast than usual. Good.

      • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday October 22 2020, @01:16PM (2 children)

        by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Thursday October 22 2020, @01:16PM (#1067484) Journal

        "Aristarchus acknowledges no wrongdoing blah blah blah . . . "

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @06:00PM (1 child)

          by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @06:00PM (#1067603)

          I don't see any aristarchus posts. What are you guys talking about? Is this more "antifa"?

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @06:06PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @06:06PM (#1067606)

            Hell no, antifa is just an idea.

  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by SpockLogic on Thursday October 22 2020, @11:58AM (20 children)

    by SpockLogic (2762) on Thursday October 22 2020, @11:58AM (#1067458)

    I don't see one person plead guilty so I don't see anyone going to jail.

    Until the Sacklers go to jail and their ill gotten drug pushing gains are confiscated there will be no justice. A fine is just the cost of doing business.

    --
    Overreacting is one thing, sticking your head up your ass hoping the problem goes away is another - edIII
    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday October 22 2020, @12:01PM (4 children)

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Thursday October 22 2020, @12:01PM (#1067461) Journal

      I don't see one person plead guilty so I don't see anyone going to jail.

      Trying the people responsible would be a separate court case. The business pleading guilty will have a negative consequence for trials involving corporate officers.

      • (Score: 3, Interesting) by SpockLogic on Thursday October 22 2020, @12:10PM (3 children)

        by SpockLogic (2762) on Thursday October 22 2020, @12:10PM (#1067463)

        Let me know if and/or when anyone is indicted.

        I won't hold my breath.

        --
        Overreacting is one thing, sticking your head up your ass hoping the problem goes away is another - edIII
        • (Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday October 22 2020, @01:13PM (1 child)

          by Immerman (3985) on Thursday October 22 2020, @01:13PM (#1067483)

          Agreed. When do you ever see executives held responsible for the crimes they oversaw? Only when the crime is committed against the company itself, and not even reliably then.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @02:42PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @02:42PM (#1067516)

            This is white collar crime involving billionaires, they won't be tried. That being said, the activities the were engaged in should be far more than what's necessary to pierce the veil separating them from the corporation and go after them directly. Just because you're organized as some sort of liability shielded corporate entity doesn't mean you get unlimited protection. They did go after a number of people involved with Enron and MCI-Worldcom back when they still prosecuted white collar crime occasionally. Otherwise every criminal syndicate would be an LLC and they wouldn't bother hiding their activities. They'd just start a new one every time the old one got busted.

            The main reason why you probably won't see that happen now is that the politicians are that much more corrupt than they were back then. They pretend like ordinary people don't care or don't understand enough of what's going on to want blood, they are wrong. The people have a surprisingly good understanding of a lot of these crimes even if they don't understand all the specifics of how it works.

            These are individuals who need to be publicly executed in front of the NYSE in order to serve as a warning for the rest of the traitorous rats that their time can come too.

        • (Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Thursday October 22 2020, @05:23PM

          by DeathMonkey (1380) on Thursday October 22 2020, @05:23PM (#1067581) Journal

          Let me know if and/or when anyone is indicted.

          I won't hold my breath.

          I'm not holding my breath either. But....both articles do say the criminal investigation is still in progress.

          This is from the Business Insider one:

          The deal does not release any of the company's executives or owners — members of the wealthy Sackler family — from criminal liability. A criminal investigation is ongoing.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @01:19PM (5 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @01:19PM (#1067487)

      Cost of doing business? Did you miss the bit where the company is being dissolved?

      • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @02:23PM (4 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @02:23PM (#1067507)

        They are indeed in bankruptcy proceedings which makes this even less of a slap on the wrist than it already was. The bankruptcy court will likely reduce this substantially.

        Really, we need the death penalty here, execute a few of the Sacklers for the thousands upon thousands of deaths that their corrupt activities caused and perhaps the next pharmaceutical company will think twice before doing it. If we're going to have that bullshit felony murder charge where people are charged with murder even if they didn't pull the trigger, intend for the trigger to be pulled or were even in the room at the time, we should be able to find a way of applying it to these sons of bitches that have caused so many deaths.

        • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Gaaark on Thursday October 22 2020, @03:01PM (2 children)

          by Gaaark (41) on Thursday October 22 2020, @03:01PM (#1067527) Journal

          Yup! Hold the people MAKING THE DECISIONS accountable.

          They killed people KNOWING they'd die: so, charge them with murder. A drug pusher killing people on the street woud get murder or manslaughter...why is this different from what the Sacklers did?

          --
          --- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @06:42PM (1 child)

            by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @06:42PM (#1067620)

            I knew a girl who was convicted of manslaughter when her friend ODed while they were smoking crack together... These lying pill pushers are far worse.

            • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 23 2020, @02:11AM

              by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 23 2020, @02:11AM (#1067767)

              That's why there needs to be safe harbor laws to protect people like that if they choose to report the OD to the authorities while there's still some hope of saving them.

              But yeah, if you kill or allow a couple people to die they go super hard and try to have capital punishment, but if you kill dozens you get life and if you cause tens of thousands to die, they let you off with a slap on the wrist and an admonishment.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @10:47PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @10:47PM (#1067713)

          That depends. Criminal conviction fines like this are one of the highest priority debts and probably not be dischargeable.

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by Runaway1956 on Thursday October 22 2020, @01:21PM (6 children)

      by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Thursday October 22 2020, @01:21PM (#1067489) Journal

      I'm with you. When the individual members of the family start losing assets, then I'll be satisfied. Sell off their homes, their cars, take all of their investments, all of their collectible doo-diddies, the summer home in the mountains, the other summer home in the Bahamas, all of it. They can learn New American, "Would you like fries with that?"

      • (Score: 3, Funny) by DeathMonkey on Thursday October 22 2020, @04:10PM (4 children)

        by DeathMonkey (1380) on Thursday October 22 2020, @04:10PM (#1067552) Journal

        But that would be SOCIALISM! Isn't the FREE MARKET supposed to sort out all that addiction nonsense? Only the NANNY STATE would punish these brave Capitalists for simply making money!

        • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday October 22 2020, @05:08PM (3 children)

          by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Thursday October 22 2020, @05:08PM (#1067568) Journal

          Apparently, you've confused me with - - - - someone.

          • (Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Thursday October 22 2020, @05:15PM (2 children)

            by DeathMonkey (1380) on Thursday October 22 2020, @05:15PM (#1067572) Journal

            Yep, I confused you with someone who has convictions.

            • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday October 22 2020, @05:21PM (1 child)

              by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Thursday October 22 2020, @05:21PM (#1067580) Journal

              Nope. I've never been to prison.

              • (Score: 4, Touché) by DeathMonkey on Thursday October 22 2020, @05:45PM

                by DeathMonkey (1380) on Thursday October 22 2020, @05:45PM (#1067591) Journal

                I've never been to prison.

                And therefore, prison reform would be evil socialism.

                'Cause it's always the same pattern. All government is evil nanny state socialism right up until it's something that affects you personally like an opioid epidemic. At which point you take all those big government handouts and as much assistance as you can get.

                When this happens to normal people they think "hmm...maybe some of these programs are warranted."

                When it happens to you it simply gets added to the nanny-state-exception-list and you go right back accusing everybody else who needs help of being thieves and cons.

      • (Score: 1) by khallow on Friday October 23 2020, @01:31PM

        by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Friday October 23 2020, @01:31PM (#1067861) Journal

        When the individual members of the family start losing assets

        They've already lost Purdue Pharma. Their rainmaker is gone. Given the number of states and private parties looking for blood, I don't think they're going to get out of this unscathed.

    • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @05:01PM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @05:01PM (#1067565)

      Drug pushing? There's no such thing. Noone has to "push" drugs. They sell themselves. Grown people are responsible for their own drug habits. Now, if Purdue was truly involved in fraud (towards the customers not the parasites in government) then that is actually a crime.

      • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday October 22 2020, @05:11PM

        by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Thursday October 22 2020, @05:11PM (#1067571) Journal

        You haven't been paying attention then. Professionals who people trust with their lives were actively pushing these drugs. Actively pushing. Not just standing on a street corner, "Hey buddy, what ya need? I got it all, name your poison!"

  • (Score: 2) by HiThere on Thursday October 22 2020, @02:01PM (1 child)

    by HiThere (866) Subscriber Badge on Thursday October 22 2020, @02:01PM (#1067501) Journal

    Tobacco. Eventually there was a push-back that caused doctors and imitation doctors to stop pushing it on TV, but for a long time they did.

    --
    Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
    • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @02:29PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 22 2020, @02:29PM (#1067510)

      That's a bit different, tobacco typically takes years of use before cancer and emphysema happen. There's also numerous warning signs that even the most moronic should notice that it's doing bad things. By comparison, getting hooked on opioids is a lot faster and the possibly fatal results also come a lot faster. It's pretty much impossible to smoke so many cigarettes in a given day that this is alone fatal. It takes smoking over a relatively long period of time before you get a statistically significant increase in cancer or heart disease from it.

      Not to mention, that despite all the whining from smokers that "can't quit" the reality is that quitting is pretty straightforward, lock yourself in a room away from cigarettes and you'll magically stop smoking them. Unlike many other substances, like alcohol, where withdrawal can be fatal, nicotine withdrawal is just miserably, but not actually going to kill you. I remember when I was drying out from alcohol nearly 20 years ago that even though I was a relative lightweight in terms of my drinking when compared to other alcoholics, I still got sick as all hell during the process. I hadn't even been drinking that hard or that long either, somebody who was doing more of both probably would have ended up in the hospital trying to quit cold turkey like that.

      I can't speak to quitting opioids specifically, but realistically, the consequences of misusing them are significantly worse than most of the other drugs people do in all regards.