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Purdue pharma pleaded guilty to criminal charges for handling his prescription addictive pain reliever OxyContin, ending deal with federal prosecutors to resolve investigation into drugmaker’s role in the United States opioid crisis.
In a remote court hearing today before U.S. District Judge Madeline Cox Arleo in New Jersey, Purdue pleaded guilty to three felonies of general misconduct, Reuters reports.
Criminal offenses included conspiring to defraud U.S. officials and paying illegal bribes to doctors and an electronic health records provider, all to help maintain medically questionable opioid prescriptions.
Members of billionaire sackler family who owns Purdue were not part of today’s court proceedings and have not been criminally charged.
They agreed in October to pay another Civil penalty of $ 225 million for allegedly causing false claims for OxyContin to government health programs such as Medicare. they have refuse the allegations.
President Purdue Steve miller pleaded guilty on behalf of the company and admitted his criminal conduct under questioning by US Deputy Lawyer J. Stephen Ferketic.
Of the three counts against Purdue, two involved violations of a federal anti-bribery law while another accused the Stamford, Connecticut-based company of defrauding the United States. and violating the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act.
Purdue’s plea deal carries more than $ 5.5 billion in penalties, most of which will go unpaid. A criminal fine of $ 3.54 billion is expected to be considered along with trillions of dollars in unsecured debt as part of Purdue’s bankruptcy proceeding.
Purdue agreed to pay $ 225 million for a $ 2 billion criminal confiscation, while the Department of Justice waived the rest if the company went through a bankruptcy reorganization by dissolving and transferring its assets to a “corporation. of public interest ”or a similar entity that manages the $ 1.775 billion unpaid. party to thousands of American communities suing him over the opioid crisis.
A conviction imposing those penalties is about to fall on the line, around the time Purdue receives court approval for a bankruptcy reorganization.
Purdue has filed for bankruptcy and the case is still pending in New York bankruptcy court.
Many want the Sacklers who own Purdue to face criminal charges personally and not escape trial in thousands of lawsuits from coast to coast. As of this writing, Beverly Sackler and Jonathan Sackler have passed away, but the issues facing the other Sackler members have not gone away.
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