Oklahoma Supreme Court Tosses Opioid Award Against J&J
- Judge misapplied nuisance law in $465 million award to state
- Ruling is companies’ second win in sprawling opioid litigation
The Oklahoma Supreme Court threw out a $465 million opioid award against Johnson & Johnson after finding a judge wrongfully concluded the drug maker violated state law with its marketing campaigns.
The state’s highest court on Tuesday ruled Judge Thad Balkman misconstrued Oklahoma’s public-nuisance law in ruling in 2019 J&J’s marketing of its painkillers helped fuel the state’s opioid epidemic. He concluded J&J should pay hundreds of millions to fund treatment and other social-services programs.
Oklahoma is one of many states and municipalities that have sued opioid makers such as J&J under public-nuisance law, accusing them of fueling an epidemic that’s killing more than 100 Americans a day.
Tuesday’s ruling was the pharmaceutical industry’s second recent win in the sprawling, four-year litigation over opioids. Last week, J&J, Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd and other drug makers defeated a lawsuit by local governments in California claiming the companies created a public-health crisis through misleading marketing of their drugs.