Catoosa County Takes on Drugmakers With Opioid Lawsuit
Catoosa County near the Tennessee and Alabama state lines has filed a lawsuit against multiple defendants in federal court seeking damages for economic losses as a result of the opioid addiction crisis.
April 10, 2018 at 06:15 PM
4 minute read
A small county in Northwest Georgia has joined the litigation battle against makers and sellers of opioid drugs.
Catoosa County near the Tennessee and Alabama state lines has filed a lawsuit against multiple defendants in federal court seeking damages for economic losses as a result of the opioid addiction crisis.
Catoosa County is represented by Beasley Allen lawyers Rhon E. Jones, who is head of the firm's Toxic Torts Section, Rick Stratton, Jeff Price, Will Sutton and Ryan Kral, along with local county attorneys Clifton M. “Skip” Patty, Jr. and C. Chad Young of Patty & Young Attorneys at Law in Ringgold.
The complaint is filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, Rome Division.
Beasley Allen has filed similar lawsuits on behalf of a number of Alabama municipalities, as well as Sumner County, Tennessee. The firm also is representing the State of Alabama in its opioid lawsuit against Purdue Pharmaceuticals.
Purdue shared this statement:
“We are deeply troubled by the opioid crisis and we are dedicated to being part of the solution. As a company grounded in science, we must balance patient access to FDA-approved medicines, while working collaboratively to solve this public health challenge. Although our products account for approximately 2% of the total opioid prescriptions, as a company, we've distributed the CDC Guideline for Prescribing Opioids for Chronic Pain, developed the first FDA-approved opioid medication with abuse-deterrent properties and partner with law enforcement to ensure access to naloxone. We vigorously deny these allegations and look forward to the opportunity to present our defense.”
Beasley Allen's Jones said in a news release Tuesday that the pharmaceutical industry deceived the American public when it flooded the market with highly addictive opioids.
“The industry's unrestrained greed created an opioid epidemic that continues to unfold across the nation. Local resources have been stretched beyond many local governments' limits, costing them a total of $504 billion dollars annually as they fight the complex and multifaceted problems that accompany opioid addiction,” Jones said.
“Catoosa County has been held in opioid's tight grip, draining our local resources all because of the pharmaceutical industry's greed,” Young said. “We want the industry to know that you cannot hide any longer. It is time that you pay for ripping apart families and communities and for leveraging your untold fortune on the backs or hard-working taxpayers.”
“Thanks to Big Pharma, between 1999 and 2014, prescription opioid deaths increased tenfold in Georgia,” Patty said in the Beasley Allen news release. “It has landed us as the 11th state in the country for the most prescription opioid overdoses. Local governments have triaged the victims and have begun to rebuild after the opioid epidemic took their communities by storm. Now they are seeking justice and reparation from those responsible for the epidemic.”
Economic damages resulting from the opioid epidemic include costs for providing medical care, therapeutic care and treatments for patients suffering from opioid-related addiction or disease, including overdoses and deaths; costs for providing counseling and rehabilitation services; costs for treating infants born with opioid-related medical conditions; public safety and law enforcement expenses; and care for children whose parents suffer from opioid-related disability or incapacitation, the lawyers said.
In 2016, Catoosa County had an opioid prescription rate of 116.1 for every 100 people. Nationally, opioids are responsible for killing more than 183,000 people since 1999, the lawyers said, quoting the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In 2016 alone, 42,000 people in the U.S. died from opioid overdoses.
This content has been archived. It is available through our partners, LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law.
To view this content, please continue to their sites.
Not a Lexis Subscriber?
Subscribe Now
Not a Bloomberg Law Subscriber?
Subscribe Now
NOT FOR REPRINT
© 2024 ALM Global, LLC, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to [email protected]. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.
You Might Like
View AllSupreme Court Rejects Push to Move Georgia Case Against Ex-Trump Chief of Staff Mark Meadows
3 minute readTrump's Lawyers Speak Out: 'The President Had the Confidence to Retain Me'
Trending Stories
Who Got The Work
Michael G. Bongiorno, Andrew Scott Dulberg and Elizabeth E. Driscoll from Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr have stepped in to represent Symbotic Inc., an A.I.-enabled technology platform that focuses on increasing supply chain efficiency, and other defendants in a pending shareholder derivative lawsuit. The case, filed Oct. 2 in Massachusetts District Court by the Brown Law Firm on behalf of Stephen Austen, accuses certain officers and directors of misleading investors in regard to Symbotic's potential for margin growth by failing to disclose that the company was not equipped to timely deploy its systems or manage expenses through project delays. The case, assigned to U.S. District Judge Nathaniel M. Gorton, is 1:24-cv-12522, Austen v. Cohen et al.
Who Got The Work
Edmund Polubinski and Marie Killmond of Davis Polk & Wardwell have entered appearances for data platform software development company MongoDB and other defendants in a pending shareholder derivative lawsuit. The action, filed Oct. 7 in New York Southern District Court by the Brown Law Firm, accuses the company's directors and/or officers of falsely expressing confidence in the company’s restructuring of its sales incentive plan and downplaying the severity of decreases in its upfront commitments. The case is 1:24-cv-07594, Roy v. Ittycheria et al.
Who Got The Work
Amy O. Bruchs and Kurt F. Ellison of Michael Best & Friedrich have entered appearances for Epic Systems Corp. in a pending employment discrimination lawsuit. The suit was filed Sept. 7 in Wisconsin Western District Court by Levine Eisberner LLC and Siri & Glimstad on behalf of a project manager who claims that he was wrongfully terminated after applying for a religious exemption to the defendant's COVID-19 vaccine mandate. The case, assigned to U.S. Magistrate Judge Anita Marie Boor, is 3:24-cv-00630, Secker, Nathan v. Epic Systems Corporation.
Who Got The Work
David X. Sullivan, Thomas J. Finn and Gregory A. Hall from McCarter & English have entered appearances for Sunrun Installation Services in a pending civil rights lawsuit. The complaint was filed Sept. 4 in Connecticut District Court by attorney Robert M. Berke on behalf of former employee George Edward Steins, who was arrested and charged with employing an unregistered home improvement salesperson. The complaint alleges that had Sunrun informed the Connecticut Department of Consumer Protection that the plaintiff's employment had ended in 2017 and that he no longer held Sunrun's home improvement contractor license, he would not have been hit with charges, which were dismissed in May 2024. The case, assigned to U.S. District Judge Jeffrey A. Meyer, is 3:24-cv-01423, Steins v. Sunrun, Inc. et al.
Who Got The Work
Greenberg Traurig shareholder Joshua L. Raskin has entered an appearance for boohoo.com UK Ltd. in a pending patent infringement lawsuit. The suit, filed Sept. 3 in Texas Eastern District Court by Rozier Hardt McDonough on behalf of Alto Dynamics, asserts five patents related to an online shopping platform. The case, assigned to U.S. District Judge Rodney Gilstrap, is 2:24-cv-00719, Alto Dynamics, LLC v. boohoo.com UK Limited.
Featured Firms
Law Offices of Gary Martin Hays & Associates, P.C.
(470) 294-1674
Law Offices of Mark E. Salomone
(857) 444-6468
Smith & Hassler
(713) 739-1250