The attorneys representing Summit County and several other Utah counties in a massive opioid lawsuit, have filed a revision that adds over 50 more defendants to the litigation. The new defendants include several national retail pharmacy companies, as well as other manufacturers and individuals.
In March of 2018, Summit was the first Utah county to file a lawsuit against a group of Big Pharma manufacturers and distributors,contending that Summit and many other local governments have been harmed by a national opioid crisis. The suit said that the defendants, going back about 20 years, engaged in a deceptive marketing campaign that promoted opioids for long-term pain and downplayed the risks of addiction.
Summit County Attorney Margaret Olson noted that 17 other Utah counties have joined Summit’s lawsuit. She told KPCW last week that the new defendants have been added after plaintiffs obtained additional data on the dissemination of opioids locally and in Utah.
Marc McCune, one of the team of attorneys representing Summit, told us the additional defendants were named in several new filings made in Third District Court in late July. But it’s expected that once those defendants are served, the new filings will be consolidated with the original 2018 Summit County case.
That litigation, with its multitude of plaintiffs and defendants, is before Third District Court Judge Richard Mrazik in Salt Lake. He was scheduled to hear oral arguments in early September on motions by the defendants to dismiss the case.
That date has been shifted to November 14th. One major reason, said McCune, is so the new defendants can decide whether to join the request to dismiss, or pursue their own course of action.
McCune said in the revised suit the allegations and legal arguments are basically the same. But there is one new claim against a host of retail pharmaceutical companies, including Smith’s, Wal-Mart, Kroger, Costco, Rite Aid, CVS and Walgreens. He said they’re suing under the Utah Pharmacy Practices Act, which stipulates that the retail concerns had a duty to watch for and report any instances where opioid prescriptions might be diverted—for instance, to individuals who may be addicted. McCune said the pharmacies are charged with being “the last line of defense.”
The new defendants also include several members of the Sackler family, who are behind the Big Pharma companies Purdue and Rhodes Technologies, as well as John Kapoor, a co-founder of the firm Insys Technologies. At the same time, since Insys has declared bankruptcy, McCune said, that company has been severed for the moment from the litigation.
County Attorney Olson said they added the defendants based, in part on data they derived from the Automation of Reports and Consolidated Orders System maintained by the Drug Enforcement Administration. For the years 2006 to 2012, the program, known as “ARCOS” lists the opiods sold, the manufacturers, distributors and retailers, and the counties where sales were made.
According to Olson, the data shows during the years in question, millions of pills were distributed in Utah, including over 7 million in Summit County alone. Olson said that’s 24 pills a year, for every man, woman and child in the county.
The plan at this point is that Judge Mrazik will preside over the pre-trial activity for all the opioid cases. If they go to trial, the litigation will be returned to each individual county court.
