Tag: Purdue Pharma

Purdue Pharma, facing thousands of lawsuits and bankruptcy, wants to pay ‘certain employees’ $34 million in bonuses

Washington Post logoThe company ‘is not an easy place to work right now,’ its attorneys told the judge.

Officials at troubled drugmaker Purdue Pharma say “certain employees” should be paid more than $34 million in bonuses for meeting and exceeding goals over the last three years, even though the company is facing thousands of lawsuits over its role in the nation’s opioid crisis and earlier this week filed for bankruptcy.

In a legal filing, attorneys for Purdue Pharma asked a judge to authorize millions in payments to employees who have met “target performance goals.”

It is not clear from the company filings why employees would be eligible for bonuses because, while the bonuses are supposed to be partly contingent on the company’s financial performance, the company has filed for bankruptcy.

View the complete September 19 article by Peter Whoriskey on The Washington Post website here.

Purdue Pharma’s bankruptcy plan includes special protection for the Sackler family fortune

NOTE:  This is another post about trusting American corporations to do the right thing for their customers, Americans.

Washington Post logoIf lawsuits against the wealthy family aren’t halted, the Sacklers ‘may be unwilling—or unable’ to contribute billions to the drugmaker’s bankruptcy as planned, Purdue said in a court filing Wednesday.

In 2008, as Purdue Pharma was searching for a new chief executive, Richard Sackler received a memo from an adviser.

“In the event that a favorable [recapitalization] deal cannot be structured during 2008, the most certain way for the owners to diversify their risk is to distribute more free cash flow to themselves,” F. Peter Boer, a member of Purdue’s board of directors told Sackler, a prominent member of the wealthy family that owns the company.

[Read the 2008 memo from a Purdue board member to Richard Sackler]

That, authorities allege, is exactly what the Sackler family did. A lawsuit filed by the state of Massachusetts claims the Sacklers transferred more than $4 billion from the company to personal accounts between 2008 and 2016. Oregon asserts the family may have taken as much as $10 billion out of the company.

View the complete September 18 article by Renae Merle and Lenny Bernstein on the Washington Post website here.