A company at the center of the nationwide opioid epidemic has filed for bankruptcy as part of a move to settle lawsuits filed by governments around the country. But not everybody is cheering.
Stamford, Connecticut-based Purdue Pharma said Monday that it had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy as part of a more than $10 billion settlement framework that it said it had agreed to in principle, but is still subject to court approval. Purdue is the maker of OxyContin, a long-acting form of the opioid oxycodone.
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As previously reported, the settlement would include Purdue’s owners, the Sackler family, contributing at least $3 billion of their own money, along with Purdue putting all its assets into a trust or similar entity established to benefit claimants and the public at large. It would also establish a new company that would market Purdue’s products – under certain restrictions – and contribute doses of medications used to treat opioid addiction and reverse overdoses at low or no cost.
“This unique framework for a comprehensive resolution will dedicate all of the assets and resources of Purdue for the benefit of the American public,” Purdue Chairman Steve Miller said in a statement. “This settlement framework avoids wasting hundreds of millions of dollars and years on protracted litigation and instead will provide billions of dollars and critical resources to communities across the country trying to cope with the opioid crisis.”
But the move got a cold reception from some, notably from William Tong, attorney general of the company’s home state of Connecticut.
“Purdue & the Sacklers cannot cry poverty while stashing billions overseas,” he wrote in a tweet. “At every turn, we will fight their craven strategy to use bankruptcy to shield their wealth & to evade our claims to secure billions of dollars for addiction science, & treatment.”
Tong was referring to a report Friday that New York Attorney General Letitia James had found the Sackler family made about $1 billion in wire transfers to overseas bank accounts, which according to reports suggested that it had sought to shield its wealth amid the nationwide litigation.
Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey likewise balked at the bankruptcy and proposed deal.
“Out of business is exactly where Purdue Pharma belongs,” she wrote in a tweet. “But if they think they can use bankruptcy to escape accountability, after creating the worst public health crisis of our time, they are mistaken.”
Photo: Drew Angerer, Getty Images
