An Orange County Superior Court judge will hear closing arguments this week in a first of its kind lawsuit launched by local governments against multiple pharmaceutical companies claiming they engaged in a deceptive marketing scheme that downplayed risks of opioids in order to drive up sales.
A Zoom hearing is scheduled for Thursday, Sept. 30, and Friday, Oct. 1, at 9 a.m. before Judge Kim G. Dunning.
The counties of Santa Clara, Orange, Los Angeles and City of Oakland launched the lawsuit in 2014. It was the nation’s first government-initiated suit against opioid manufacturers for their alleged role in creating a crisis of addiction, abuse, and overdose deaths in those communities.
“Defendants deceived the public about the real dangers of opioids, putting profit before the public’s health,” said prosecuting official James R. Williams, an attorney for Santa Clara County.
Defendants include Purdue Pharman, Teva Pharmaceuticals, Cephalon, Johnson & Johnson, Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Ortho-McNeil Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Endo Health Solutions, Endo Pharmaceuticals, Actavis, and Watson Pharmaceuticals.
“After seven years of hard-fought litigation, we look forward to proving our case at trial, holding these manufacturers accountable, and securing much-needed relief to address the ongoing opioid crisis in our communities,” Williams added.
Among other relief, the plaintiffs seek civil penalties and abatement of the "public nuisance" created by the increase in opioid abuse and addiction.
“Defendants focused their deceptive marketing on primary care doctors, who were more likely to treat chronic pain patients and prescribe them drugs but were less likely to be schooled in treating pain and the risks and benefits of opioids and therefore more likely to accept Defendants’ misrepresentations,” the complaint states. “Defendants also targeted vulnerable patient populations like the elderly and veterans who tend to suffer from chronic pain.”
The lawsuit further alleges that the defendants engaged in false advertising and unfair competition.
On June 6, Orange County Superior Court Judge Peter Wilson rejected the opioid manufacturers' attempt to shorten the trial and instead issued a ruling that preserves the plaintiffs' public nuisance claim against the defendants.
Public nuisance is a relatively novel legal theory that has produced mixed results in various courts.
In January, an Illinois judge threw out Cook County’s public nuisance claims against J&J and others, saying there were too many other players involved in the opioid crisis, from prescribers to illegal dealers, to hold manufacturers and distributors liable, according to reporting in Legal Newsline.
And in 2013, several California municipalities won a $1.1 billion verdict against Sherwin-Williams and other paint companies on public nuisance claims. But after the California Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal the defendants settled for $305 million in 2019, without admitting liability and setting aside the judicial ruling against them.