Supreme Court blocks controversial Purdue Pharma opioid settlement • Hacker News Board

Re: Supreme Court blocks controversial Purdue Pharma opioid settlement

#261

Post by nickff » Thu, Jun 27, 2024, 7:25 PM UTC

rootusrootus wrote: post #209

chasil wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One problem of which I was unaware is that the Sackler family has largely fled the United States. Pursuing their assets introduces vast complexities of international law. "In a brief filed on behalf of the relatives of Mortimer Sackler, most of whom are based overseas, lawyers warned of “significant litigation costs and risks” in seeking to enforce any foreign court judgments against the family if the settlement were…

Considering the patience the US has with getting justice against other individuals who have fled our jurisdiction, we could do the same here. We also have an enormous amount of influence in the financial sector in other western nations, so we could at least make their lives less lavish and comfortable. Throwing up our hands and declaring it an unsolvable issue just encourages others to misbehave and then escape the s…

The question is whether to allow a smaller settlement immediately, or pursue a less-likely and possibly larger set of judgements in the future. It's not clear that it is possible to get more money out of them.

Re: Supreme Court blocks controversial Purdue Pharma opioid settlement

#262

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jun 27, 2024, 7:27 PM UTC

legitster wrote: post #229

jpalawaga wrote: post #218

This is the only reasonable outcome... you can't deny some people justice just because other people think it's fine. The sacklers have done immeasurable damage to the country. All of their wealth should be removed. Their foundation should be dismantled and used to fund damage and mental health services for addicts of the opioid crisis that they went on to create. And perhaps some of the individual pushers/purveyors o…

The Sacklers were absolved of financial liability, not criminal. A DA that thought there was a strong enough case could have brought charges this whole time irrespective of the settlement agreement. > Their foundation should be dismantled and used to fund damage and mental health services for addicts of the opioid crisis that they went on to create. Part of the settlement agreement was that they were going to turn Pu…

[deleted]

Re: Supreme Court blocks controversial Purdue Pharma opioid settlement

#263

Post by shadowgovt » Thu, Jun 27, 2024, 7:28 PM UTC

legitster wrote: post #179

I find the Supreme court decisions to be fascinating reads and overall much more interesting and complicated than most news services make them out to be.

Yes, indubitably. It's easy to lose sight of (if one doesn't read the rulings regularly) the fact that SCOTUS's job is to come to rational and deliberate rulings grounded firmly in textual and common law dating back over a thousand years. Even when one doesn't agree with the conclusion, one rarely sees a ruling that isn't reasonable (though sometimes seeing the reason involves entertaining a fact pattern other than the one you believe to be true!).

Re: Supreme Court blocks controversial Purdue Pharma opioid settlement

#264

Post by jandrese » Thu, Jun 27, 2024, 7:28 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #213

jandrese wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In this particular case a mayor rigged the competition for a garbage truck contract so that one particular company would win it. That company then overcharged the city and gave a kickback in the form of $13,000 to the mayor. The Supreme Court said this was fine and let the mayor off of the hook. If you can't prosecute with this level of evidence the law is effectively dead.

That's not what the Supreme Court decided, and its extremely misleading to suggest that. At trial, the government alleged the mayor had "rigged the competition." But the government argued, and the jury was instructed, and the Seventh Circuit agreed, that the government did not need to prove that. Because, under the Seventh Circuit's view of the law, it did not matter whether the subsequent payment actually influenced…

> The question before the Supreme Court was only whether 18 USC 666 requires proof that the payment did or could influence the official act.

And the Supreme Court's finding is that it did not because the payment happened after the action. Certainly corrupt officials in the future will never figure out a way to exploit this loophole.

This isn't the first corruption case before the court where the standard of proof seems to be "they need to write 'This is a bribe' on the notes line of the check for it to count".

Re: Supreme Court blocks controversial Purdue Pharma opioid settlement

#265

Post by nickff » Thu, Jun 27, 2024, 7:29 PM UTC

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #153

legitster wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want money from the Purdue bankruptcy entity: you just file a claim while they still have money. If you want money from the Sackler family: you need to lawyer up, prove a bunch of personal liability claims (which are very, very hard cases to win), and wait a long time. And hope they still have money. While it may feel nice to eventually, maybe , be able to throw the Sackler family in jail, it basically just bl…

> If you want money from the Purdue bankruptcy entity: you just file a claim while they still have money And as the dissent notes, this class includes the Sacklers per their 2004 indemnification agreement. So we first need to nullify that to avoid draining.

How would you propose the agreement be nullified? Was it fraudulent, or performed without shareholder approval?

Re: Supreme Court blocks controversial Purdue Pharma opioid settlement

#266

Post by alan-hn » Thu, Jun 27, 2024, 7:30 PM UTC

HDThoreaun wrote: post #215

SoftTalker wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> physicians don't get much if any training in evaluating evidence and research I find this surprising, if true.

It is largely true. Evidence in medicine widely exists but most doctors arent keeping up with it. There has been a bit of a movement toward evidence based medicine in the last decade but most docotrs are still relying on what they learned in med school instead of keeping up with literature.

Many physicians also tend to be very conservative in terms of adopting new treatments. They tend to stick with what they know "works" and don't want to take risks to try something new

Re: Supreme Court blocks controversial Purdue Pharma opioid settlement

#267

Post by xeckr » Thu, Jun 27, 2024, 7:30 PM UTC

cowboyscott wrote: post #247

xeckr wrote: post #231

I don't understand the hatred directed at the Sacklers. Oxycodone is, just like all other opiates, highly effective at suppressing pain, potentially addictive, and deadly in large enough doses. This has been common medical knowledge for millennia. Why do so many people believe that they are responsible for overdose deaths?

This provides a good overview of how Purdue accelerated opiate marketing: https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/the-sackler-familys... > A recent study, by a team of economists from the Wharton School, Notre Dame, and rand, reviewed overdose statistics in five states where Purdue opted, because of local regulations, to concentrate fewer resources in promoting its drug. The scholars found that, in those states, ove…

This is a correlation study—I understand that increasing marketing efforts leads to an increase in physician prescription, but those overdose deaths were caused by a tiny fraction of patients refusing to follow the script as issued by their physicians. Whose fault is that?

Re: Supreme Court blocks controversial Purdue Pharma opioid settlement

#268

Post by legitster » Thu, Jun 27, 2024, 7:30 PM UTC

saghm wrote: post #242

legitster wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Sacklers were absolved of financial liability, not criminal. A DA that thought there was a strong enough case could have brought charges this whole time irrespective of the settlement agreement. > Their foundation should be dismantled and used to fund damage and mental health services for addicts of the opioid crisis that they went on to create. Part of the settlement agreement was that they were going to turn Pu…

> The Sacklers were absolved of financial liability, not criminal I don't understand how this changes anything; why would it make any more sense for the subset of the victims who settled to absolve the Sacklers of financial liability towards to the victims who didn't settle? The type of liability doesn't change the fact that victims not part of the settlement shouldn't be restricted by the terms of it; being able to…

As the dissent pointed out, getting voluntary concessions from parties is generally considered a good outcome in bankruptcy court and part of the reason it exists in the first place. Any time you can take a million lawsuits and turn it into one saves a lot of legal fees for everyone and frees up our court system.

Another thing the dissent pointed out is that anyone who doesn't participate in the group settlement is only going to get the money first-come/first-serve. In bankruptcy court you can split the money more or less evenly. If everyone litigates separately, only the people with more senior claims get their money before the funds run out.

Re: Supreme Court blocks controversial Purdue Pharma opioid settlement

#269

Post by datadrivenangel » Thu, Jun 27, 2024, 7:30 PM UTC

dang wrote: post #259

I changed the URL from https://arstechnica.com/science/2024/06/opioid-settlement-to... to an article that has more information and a less baity title. If there's a better (more accurate and neutral) article, we can change it again.

Thanks Dang!

Re: Supreme Court blocks controversial Purdue Pharma opioid settlement

#270

Post by shadowgovt » Thu, Jun 27, 2024, 7:30 PM UTC

Court skipped an opportunity to quote Franklin, since "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety" actually referred to a legislature entertaining a very similar Faustian bargain (i.e. value now in exchange for perpetual promise to remove responsibility from a family).

... but probably the correct choice, as that was a legislative, not judicial, circumstance and their decision in the time has no bearing on jurisprudence.