A court in Oklahoma today (Monday) found Johnson & Johnson liable for the ravages of pain-killers in the state and fined the manufacturer $572 million. In his ruling, Judge Thad Balkman wrote that the company had created “false, misleading, and dangerous marketing campaigns” that had “caused exponentially increasing rates of addiction, overdose deaths” and babies born exposed to opioids.
The New York Times quoted attorney Brad Beckworth, who led the case for the state, as saying, “We’ve shown that J & J was at the root cause of this opioid crisis. It made billions of dollars from it over a 20-year period.”
There are more than 2,000 opioid lawsuits pending across the country. This case is expected to have a significant impact on them.