L-R: Robert Nicholas of Reed Smith, Paul Schmidt of Covington & Burling and Enu Mainigi of Williams & Connolly. Courtesy photos
After a three-month, 70-witness bench trial in West Virginia last summer, lawyers for the nation’s three largest wholesale distributors of pain drugs spent the better part of a year waiting for a ruling in the bellwether case targeting their clients with claims stemming from the opioid crisis.
On Independence Day, Senior U.S. District Judge David Faber finally dropped a 184-page opinion that handed the companies, McKesson, Cardinal Health and AmerisourceBergen, a complete defense victory. Faber found the plaintiffs’ central liability theory inconsistent with “historical and traditional” legal notions of nuisance. “To apply the law of public nuisance to the sale, marketing and distribution of products would invite litigation against any product with a known risk of harm, regardless of the benefits conferred on the public from proper use of the product,” Faber wrote.
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