Harrington, et al. v. Purdue Pharm and Sackler Family

Between 1999 and 2019, approximately 247,000 people in the United States died from prescription-opioid overdoses. Respondent PurduePharma sits at the center of that crisis. Owned and controlled by theSackler family, Purdue began marketing OxyContin, an opioid prescription pain reliever, in the mid-1990s. After Purdue earned billions of dollars in sales on the drug, in 2007 one of its affiliates pleadedguilty to a federal felony for misbranding OxyContin as a less-addictive, less-abusable alternative to other pain medications. Thousands of lawsuits followed. Fearful that the litigation would eventually impact them directly, the Sacklers initiated a "milking program,” withdrawing from Purdue approximately $11 billion—roughly 75% of thefirm's total assets—over the next decade. Those withdrawals left Purdue in a significantly weakened financial state. And in 2019, Purdue filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. During that process, the Sacklers proposed to return approximately $4.3 billion to Purdue's bankruptcy estate. In exchange, the Sackers soughta judicial order releasing the family from all opioid-related claims andenjoining victims from bringing such claims against them in the future. The bankruptcy court approved Purdue's proposed reorganization plan, including its provisions concerning the Sackler discharge. But the district court vacated that decision, holding that nothing in the law authorizes bankruptcy courts to extinguish claims against third parties like the Sacklers, without the claimants' consent. A divided panel of the Second Circuit reversed the district court and revived the bankruptcy court's order approving a modified reorganization plan.



Court filings allege the Sackler family was long aware of the legal risks, and withdrew some $11bn from the company in the decade before its bankruptcy. They stashed much of the money overseas, while using some of it to pay company taxes, making recovery difficult.

Under the terms of the settlement, the Sacklers agreed to pay up to $6.5bn and Purdue to pay $900m.