NJ Judge Sentences Purdue Pharma, Clears $8.3B Settlement

A federal judge in New Jersey on Tuesday imposed a criminal sentence on Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin, clearing the final hurdle for a multibillion-dollar settlement that will dissolve the company and replace it with a new entity dedicated to addressing the opioid crisis.

U.S. District Judge Madeline Cox Arleo accepted a 2020 plea deal between Purdue and the U.S. Department of Justice, under which the Stamford, Connecticut-based company will pay $225 million from an $8.3 billion total in fines, forfeitures and penalties. The sentencing followed hours of victim impact statements from people who lost family members to overdoses or battled addiction after receiving OxyContin prescriptions. Purdue admitted to misleading the Drug Enforcement Administration about its efforts to prevent the drug's diversion to the black market and to paying kickbacks to doctors through a speakers program and an electronic medical records company to boost prescriptions.

"It was a purposeful, intentional and sophisticated crime scheme," Arleo said, expressing sympathy for victims amid an epidemic linked to more than 900,000 U.S. deaths since 1999. She criticized federal regulators and prosecutors...