Which governments sued Purdue and the Sacklers over opioids?

analysisBy 2001 plaintiffs across the country had begun to file individual and class actions against Purdue in state and federal courts, the District Court recited in its December 2021 decision; members of the Sackler family were not named in those suits, which the page on the 2007 pleas covers. Judge Colleen McMahon's decision recounts that from about 2014 new lawsuits were filed over the promotion and marketing of OxyContin, and that this time members of the Sackler family were named as defendants. At the end of 2017 sixty-four federal cases brought by state and local government entities against Purdue and other defendants — pharmacies, other manufacturers and distributors such as McKesson Corporation — were sent to the National Prescription Opiate Litigation (MDL-2804) before Judge Dan A. Polster in the Northern District of Ohio; about 2,200 actions against Purdue were pending there when Purdue filed for bankruptcy, and more than 390 parallel actions were pending in state and local courts. The decision uses "Purdue" for Purdue Pharma L.P. and its affiliated debtors and names McKesson only as an example of a co-defendant in the MDL cases, not as a party to Purdue's settlements. ¹

analysisThe same decision explains how the family came to be sued. Once the MDL discovery revealed family members' role in marketing OxyContin after 2007, complaints in many state cases were amended to name them as defendants; the decision lists Richard, Jonathan, Mortimer D.A., Kathe, Beverly, Theresa and David Sackler, Ilene Sackler Lefcourt and Marianna Sackler as named in various lawsuits. In at least three of these cases state courts denied the Sackler defendants' motions to dismiss, among them by an order of 21 June 2019 in In re Opioid Litigation, No. 400000/2017, in Suffolk County, New York; at the 2021 confirmation hearing the creditors' committee put the judgments that litigating against the Sacklers could eventually produce at more than $4.275 billion. Being named as a defendant is not a finding of liability, and none of these cases reached judgment before the bankruptcy. The Sacklers, the decision records, do not concede the truth of Purdue's admissions in its 2020 plea agreement and vehemently deny that the transfers they received would qualify as fraudulent conveyances. ¹

analysisBy the middle of 2019 the attorneys general of forty-nine states had filed new or amended suits against Purdue, all naming specific family members or Sackler-related entities, according to the District Court. Of the governments that later appealed the 2021 confirmation order, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and the District of Columbia sued both Purdue and family members — the District of Columbia's suit naming Richard Sackler — while Washington sued Purdue and unnamed "Does". Every one of these suits was filed before the September 2019 bankruptcy filing and none was litigated to judgment; the only pre-bankruptcy judgment the court notes, in North Dakota's suit, went in Purdue's favour. ¹

analysisHow many suits were pending at the filing depends on who counted and when. The list of the 50 largest unsecured creditors filed with Purdue Pharma L.P.'s petition on 15 September 2019 said certain debtors were defendants in over 2,600 opioid actions, whose claims it called contingent, unliquidated and disputed. Craig Landau, then Purdue's President and CEO, stated in written testimony to the House Committee on Oversight and Reform of 17 December 2020 that the company had faced nearly 2,800 lawsuits in all 50 states when it filed. The courts counted the actions covered by Purdue's injunction motion: over 2,900 against Purdue and at least 400 civil suits against the Sacklers according to the District Court, almost 3,000 and over 400 according to the Second Circuit. The retained records do not reconcile these totals. ^{2 3 1}

analysisMassachusetts sued in Suffolk Superior Court (Civil Action No. 1884-CV-01808 (BLS2), also cited as No. 18-1808-BLS2). Its defendants fall into three groups: the companies, Purdue Pharma L.P. and Purdue Pharma Inc.; eight family members sued individually — Richard, Theresa, Kathe, Jonathan, Mortimer D.A., Beverly and David Sackler and Ilene Sackler Lefcourt; and the directors Peter Boer, Paulo Costa, Cecil Pickett, Ralph Snyderman and Judy Lewent with the executives John Stewart, Mark Timney, Craig Landau and Russell J. Gasdia. The individual defendants moved to dismiss the claims against them. Former CEO John Stewart, in a declaration served on 1 March 2019 for his, Landau's and Timney's motion to dismiss the First Amended Complaint, stated that many allegations against him were not supported by, and some were contradicted by, the documents the Commonwealth cited, and Landau and Timney said the same; family members and the independent directors filed declarations in March 2019 for their own motions to dismiss, among them those of Mortimer D.A. Sackler and Ilene Sackler Lefcourt, which base their motions on lack of personal jurisdiction, while Richard Sackler stated that he did not direct marketing, sales or promotion in Massachusetts and never went into the field there with sales representatives to promote opioids. On 16 September 2019 a notice was filed that the Chapter 11 petitions of Purdue Pharma L.P. and its affiliates, filed the day before, stayed the case against the debtors; the automatic stay did not reach the family members and other related parties, whose cases were halted by the preliminary injunction issued in the debtors' adversary proceeding against the Commonwealth (Adv. Pro. No. 19-08289). ^{1 2 3 4 5 6}

analysisConnecticut's Attorney General William Tong, at the request of the Commissioner of Consumer Protection, sued under the Connecticut Unfair Trade Practices Act in the Complex Litigation Docket at Hartford (No. X07 HHD-CV-19-6105325-S). The amended complaint of 6 May 2019 alleges unfair and deceptive practices from June 2007 against Purdue Pharma L.P. and Purdue Pharma Inc., against the same eight family members, against the directors Frank Peter Boer, Paulo Costa, Cecil Pickett, Ralph Snyderman and Judith Lewent, and against John Stewart and Mark Timney; according to the District Court it pleaded four CUTPA counts and one fraudulent-transfer count against Purdue and the family members and sought civil penalties, restitution and disgorgement, and a later bench ruling of the Bankruptcy Court cites a second amended complaint of 1 July 2019. These are the State's allegations, and the case was not litigated to judgment before the bankruptcy. Connecticut was one of the eight states and the District of Columbia that, while the plan's confirmation was on appeal, filed with the debtors and the Sacklers a new settlement agreement providing for additional Sackler contributions, approved by the Bankruptcy Court on 10 March 2022, and agreed to withdraw their opposition to the plan; the Chapter 11 page follows that plan through the appeals. ^{7 8 9}

analysisThe New York Attorney General sued Purdue Pharma in Suffolk County in August 2018 (New York v. Purdue Pharma L.P., et al., No. 400016/2018) over the marketing of OxyContin and, by an amended complaint filed on 28 March 2019 — described by the Attorney General's office as a lawsuit expanding the 2018 suit — added claims against eight family members for public nuisance, fraud, fraudulent conveyances and other counts, and against "Sackler entities", including Rosebay and Beacon, which the State described as vehicles for moving funds from Purdue to the family, for unjust enrichment and fraudulent conveyance. The caption reproduced with the court's letter rogatory of September 2019 lists Purdue Pharma L.P., Purdue Pharma Inc., The Purdue Frederick Company, Inc., The P.F. Laboratories, Inc., Purdue Holdings L.P. (now Pharmaceutical Research Associates L.P.), PLP Associates Holdings, L.P., Rosebay Medical Company L.P., The Beacon Company, ten Doe entities, Richard S., Jonathan D., Mortimer D.A., Kathe A., David A., Beverly and Theresa Sackler and Ilene Sackler Lefcourt, other manufacturers, and the distributors McKesson Corporation, Cardinal Health, Inc., AmerisourceBergen Drug Corporation and Rochester Drug Cooperative, Inc., which were sued in their own capacity as wholesale distributors — a litigation role separate from their commercial role as Purdue's customers and creditors. These were the State's claims and were not litigated to judgment; Pharmaceutical Research Associates L.P. and PLP Associates Holdings L.P. moved to dismiss on 5 August 2019, with the State's opposition due on 26 August 2019, and in February 2021 the Attorney General's office said the cases against Purdue were in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court. ^{8 10 11 12}

analysisRhode Island's Attorney General Peter F. Neronha sued in the Providence/Bristol County Superior Court (State of Rhode Island v. Purdue Pharma L.P. et al., C.A. No. PC2018-4555). The Third Amended Complaint of 22 March 2022 groups as the "Purdue Defendants" Purdue Pharma L.P., Purdue Pharma Inc. and The Purdue Frederick Company, Rhodes Pharmaceuticals L.P., Rhodes Technologies and Rhodes Technologies Inc., and Richard S. Sackler, the only family member it names, alongside other manufacturers and three distributors; the State had voluntarily dismissed its claims against Insys Therapeutics and that company's former chairman in June 2019. The complaint's claims against these defendants are the State's allegations. The District Court had described Rhode Island's earlier pleading as asserting six claims against Purdue and the eight family members, and the retained record does not explain the difference. Rhode Island was also one of the nine governments in the settlement with the debtors and the Sacklers approved on 10 March 2022, and agreed to withdraw its opposition to the plan. ^{13 8}

analysisDelaware was among the first states to sue Purdue, its Attorney General's office says: former Attorney General Matthew Denn filed suit in 2018, and Attorney General Kathy Jennings sued the Sackler family in 2019; the District Court describes Delaware's consumer-fraud, negligence and public-nuisance claims as directed at seven family members, Beverly Sackler not among them. On 1 May 2026 Delaware's Attorney General announced that the $7.4 billion settlement with Purdue Pharma and the Sackler family had become legally effective and resolves the litigation against Purdue and the Sacklers. Maryland's Consumer Protection Division opened an administrative proceeding, In re Purdue Pharma, et al., on 16 May 2019 against Purdue and certain related parties, alleging unfair and deceptive trade practices, and, according to the District Court, asserted a consumer-protection claim against seven family members; these are the State's allegations as two S.D.N.Y. decisions describe them, and the pleading itself is not retained. Maryland suspended the proceeding after electing, as one of the non-consenting states, to abide by the bankruptcy injunction voluntarily. From the extension order of 6 September 2024 — which the 2024 decision calls both the thirty-fifth extension and the Thirty-Seventh Amended Order — Maryland no longer consented; it appealed the extension orders of 6 September, 27 September and 1 November 2024, and on 26 November 2024 Judge McMahon affirmed them. ^{14 8 3}

analysisOther states acted in other forums. In Utah, the Division of Consumer Protection's administrative matter CP-2019-005 (DCP Case No. 107102) named Purdue Pharma L.P., Purdue Pharma Inc. and The Purdue Frederick Company Inc. as respondents and, individually and as owners, officers, directors or key employees, Richard Sackler and Kathe Sackler; the companies and the two individuals had separate counsel, and the retained filing, a procedural motion of 11 June 2019, states neither the Division's allegations nor any outcome. In Illinois, according to a press report, Attorney General Kwame Raoul, who had sued Purdue Pharma L.P. and Purdue Pharma Inc. in April 2019, moved in August 2019 to add eight family members, alleging that as board members they took part in or approved the deceptive marketing and directed billions of dollars of company money to their own accounts; the motion and its outcome are not in the retained record. In West Virginia, according to another press report, Attorney General Patrick Morrisey announced in May 2019 a second suit, filed with Iowa, Kansas, Maryland and Wisconsin, seeking damages from Purdue Pharma Inc., Purdue Pharma LP and Richard Sackler over alleged unlawful marketing of opioids; the complaint is not retained, and the report states that Purdue denied the claims, said the states could not link the harm of opioids to the company and accused them of having "invented stunningly overbroad legal theories". ^{15 16 17}

analysisColorado's suit named eight family members, Jonathan Sackler among them, according to a 2020 press report that also recorded his death on 30 June 2020; the Colorado complaint is not retained. Arizona, according to a 2021 law-school student case study, filed an action in the original jurisdiction of the U.S. Supreme Court on 31 July 2019, State of Arizona v. Richard Sackler et al., No. 22O151, alleging under its fraudulent-transfer laws that the family unlawfully moved billions of dollars out of Purdue Pharma L.P. to avoid liability; the study cites Arizona's motion for leave to file, which is not retained, with a date of 6 August 2019, and reports, citing a December 2019 press report, that the Supreme Court declined to hear the case. ^{18 19}

analysisNew York also sought evidence about the family's assets through its Suffolk County case. On 13 September 2019 a letter rogatory was filed in which the Supreme Court of the State of New York asked the courts of the British Virgin Islands, under the Hague Evidence Convention, for documents from Banela Corporation for the State's claims that certain defendants made fraudulent conveyances or were unjustly enriched; it expected a trial in about May 2020, and the retained copy leaves the date beside the judge's signature line blank. Its list of non-parties names Debevoise & Plimpton LLP as counsel for Stillwater Holdings LLC, Banela Corporation, Stanhope Gate Corporation, Millborne Trust Company Limited, Heatheridge Trust Company Limited and Jonathan G. White. A lawyer's commentary of October 2019 adds that the Attorney General subpoenaed nine U.S. banking groups and others, including BR Holdings Associates Inc., to trace alleged fraudulent transfers by the family. Both describe the State's allegations, not findings, and the subpoenas other than Banela's are not retained. The trial did not take place: Purdue filed for Chapter 11 two days after the letter rogatory, and on 11 October 2019 the Bankruptcy Court enjoined the litigation, which, the commentary says, froze the subpoenas and letters rogatory as well. ^{1 2 3}

analysisSeveral states settled with Purdue before the bankruptcy, according to the list in the District Court's 2021 decision. Florida ended an investigation in 2002 for $500,000. West Virginia settled an action in 2004 for $10 million, releasing its Attorney General's claims arising from the manufacture, marketing and sale of OxyContin in the state against Purdue and its affiliates, shareholders, officers, directors and others. Mississippi settled an investigation in 2006 for $250,000. New York ended an investigation on 19 August 2015 by an assurance of discontinuance (In the Matter of Purdue Pharma L.P., No. 15-151) under which Purdue paid a $75,000 penalty and committed to keep implementing its abuse and diversion detection (ADD) program in New York and to submit to annual reviews and monitoring by the Attorney General. ¹

analysisKentucky's action against Purdue was settled for $24 million. Connecticut's 2019 complaint says the suit was filed in 2007 and that Purdue agreed to pay the sum over eight years under a settlement announced in late 2015; the District Court dates the settlement to 2016 in its list and to 2015 where it records that Richard Sackler, at the 2021 confirmation hearing, acknowledged approving it as a member of the board of Purdue Pharma Inc. and said he had overseen "many settlements, both private and public" as a director. The difference may reflect announcement and completion, and the agreement itself is not retained. An online encyclopedia article, a secondary account, adds that Richard Sackler was deposed in Louisville in 2015 and that Purdue settled before trial for $24 million, admitting no liability, with the deposition sealed and the Kentucky prosecutors required to destroy or return internal documents obtained in discovery; it says that a medical news publication later sued to unseal the deposition, a state judge ruled in its favour, Purdue appealed, and the deposition was later made public. No retained primary record shows these settlement terms or the unsealing litigation. ^{1 2 3}

analysisThe largest pre-bankruptcy settlement was Oklahoma's. In March 2019, two months before a scheduled trial, Purdue — the District Court's term for Purdue Pharma L.P. and its affiliated debtors — agreed to pay the State $270 million (Consent Judgment, Oklahoma v. Purdue Pharma et al., No. CJ-2017-816, District Court of Cleveland County, 26 March 2019), secured largely by letters of credit according to Connecticut's complaint; the District Court records that the release covered the claims of the Attorney General, the State and its subdivisions against Purdue and its officers, directors, shareholders, direct and indirect owners and beneficiaries of the owners. The consent judgment itself is not retained. Connecticut's complaint also states that the "Dr. Mortimer and Dr. Raymond Sackler families" agreed to a "voluntary and irrevocable contribution" of $75 million in settlement of the case; it does not say whether that sum was part of or in addition to the $270 million, or which family entities paid it. The plan later confirmed in the bankruptcy describes the State's pre-petition settlement as one "with the Debtors and certain of the Sackler Parties and/or their Related Parties", keeps a fund for Oklahoma's subdivisions and waives the settlement's release conditions so that the litigating subdivisions may also share in the Governmental Remediation Trust. ^{1 2 4}

analysisThe governmental suits were not covered by the automatic stay that came with the bankruptcy filing. On 18 September 2019 Purdue asked the Bankruptcy Court to halt all actions against the debtors and against their current and former owners, officers, directors, employees and associated entities; according to the District Court, the court on 11 October 2019 halted the litigation until 6 November 2019 and then enjoined all plaintiffs from continuing or commencing actions against Purdue or the non-debtor related parties, including Sackler family members, and the District Court affirmed the injunction in 2020. The injunction protected non-debtors, including family members and their entities, but was a procedural stay, not a release or a finding on the merits; the Chapter 11 page sets out its many extensions and the plans negotiated under it. How each suit was settled or stayed is stated with the suit above. The plan became effective on 1 May 2026, when, the New York Attorney General announced, Purdue Pharma ceased operations and Knoa Pharma began operating in its place. ^{1 2 3 4 5 6 7}