OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma is pleading guilty to criminal felony charges of defrauding federal health agencies and violating anti-kickback laws, and has agreed to pay $5.5 billion in criminal fines and forfeitures. They also have agreed to pay another $2.8 billion in civil penalties.
The thing is, the company doesn’t have the money for that, so they plan to simply close, or dissolve, the business as part of the settlement. “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,” CNN Business said.
Some lawmakers, however, say that’s an escape for the people directly responsible for the opioid epidemic, and they want them held responsible: In a letter to U.S. Attorney General William Barr, several senators demanded that the Sackler family — which owns Purdue Pharma — also be charged with criminal acts. “They intentionally addicted millions of unsuspecting people to powerful painkillers, and their actions directly contributed to the deaths of tens of thousands of Americans,” the senators wrote.
“While millions of Americans struggled to cope with the effects of opioid addiction and the overdose deaths caused by Purdue’s fraudulent marketing strategy, the company generated an estimated $30 billion in OxyContin sales and the Sacklers became one of the richest families in America.”