OxyCoffin

 “Painkiller,” directed by Peter Berg, 2023

This is a semi-fictional limited series based on the actual facts of the Sackler family's production and sale of OxyContin. It features a relentless African-American investigator, Edie Flowers, who represents the state of Virginia. She is tracking one doctor's very high claims for x-rays, only to discover that he's fabricating 50 x-rays a day in order to rake in state money. He claims there is nothing else untoward going on at his clinic, but then she discovers he's writing tons of script for a 'new' opiod painkiller called Oxycontin. And he's not alone. She also finds out young, cute former sorority sisters are pitching Oxy to male doctors to prescribe and then 'up' the dose of the Oxy pills they dole out. Some of them snort Oxy and sleep with the doctors to get their commissions, and the higher the dose, the more profit to Sackler's Purdue Pharma. Flowers calls them 'the Barbies.'

The sorry facts of the epidemic are laid out in personal detail in the story of a tire repair shop owner whose injured at work, and becomes addicted, losing his wife, family and business to his addiction. OxyContin was basically a legal form of heroin. People crushed the pills and snorted them. Crimes are committed to get more drugs, and some rave into violence. It became a street drug sold by dealers. Overdoses become common-place in some towns and cities. Between 350-500K died from Oxy and other opioids. Now Fentanyl has taken OxyContin's place and overdoses continue, as the social context has not changed.

How did OxyContin happen? Sackler bribed the one scientist in the FDA in charge of Ok'ing OxyContin with a $400k job to get it finally approved. They hired the first open anti-Oxy politician from Maine to become a lucrative Sackler 'consultant' instead. This is a good snapshot of obvious 'regulatory capture.' Since Oxycontin was 'legal' the Virginia DA and eventually the U.S. DOJ had to find what the crime was. This was the investigator's final job and Flowers finds external and internal sources to make the case.

Mathew Broderick plays the vile greed-bag 'Dr.' Richard Sackler whose first principle is never admit wrong, always deny and instead attack and blame the druggies and junkies for their addiction. This is advice he gets from the 'ghost' of his hard-ass uncle, who constantly primes him to defend the honor and reputation of the Sackler name. That name is scattered across many art museums, including one I found on the French Riviera town of Antibes in a Picasso museum of all places.

The name will live on in infamy

One of the creepiest scenes is a Purdue 'sales' convention in a Florida hotel where all the sales reps are invited. It's a little like rah-rah conventions celebrating pyramid schemes. Everyone is cheering, drinking, some snorting Oxy, dancing along with a blue stuffed pill as confetti rains down and Richard Sackler smirks. Holy shit! It's a banner year for sales.

The Sackler defendants were represented in court at the first trial in 2007 by a high-end team – among them: Mary Jo White, former SDNY DA and now head of the SEC appointed by Obama; Rudy Giuliani, former SDNY DA and now indicted and disgraced Trump lawyer. The prosecution spent countless hours reading documents, texts and e-mails; viewing training videos; interviewing witnesses; making phone calls trying to accumulate enough facts to indict. The settlement got the Sacklers small fines, a slap on the wrist and were still allowed to crank out Oxy pills, even after being criminally charged with false advertising! And that advertising continued... This weak settlement was after a Sackler lawyer's phone call to the tops of the DOJ, who then contacted the Bush White House. The DOJ then counseled the DOJ attorney handling the case on the appropriate weak 'settlement.' This shows you that the legal system is vulnerable to 'legal capture' by corporations and powerful individuals.

This sad result basically irritated the investigator to the point Flowers could no longer pursue the matter to justice, handing off the baton to others. Later, state attorney-generals – with the notable absence of southern states – got settlements from the firm. The 'others' in this series are a battery of high-priced lawyers who finally get reclusive Richard Sackler into a deposition, and so they interview Flowers too. The DOJ never actually subpoenaed Sackler.

The OxyContin / Sackler saga continues to this day, as the state fines and subsequent bankruptcy of Purdue still left the family with millions, along with guaranteed personal immunity. They took money out of Purdue before declaring bankruptcy, looting the firm to enrich themselves. The main settlement is paid by their fortune's interest over 9 years, so it avoids their capital. Purdue Pharma's bankruptcy settlement and the Sackler's personal immunity provision were astonishingly rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court last month in August 2023. So the legal case continues long after 2007, reflecting our wretched legal system.

This entertaining 6 part series is worth watching, if only to see how one branch of Big Pharma functioned. The no-nonsense investigator, Flowers, is the main draw. She's experienced drug addiction in her family, so its personal.

Prior blog reviews on this subject, use blog search box, upper left, to investigate our 16 year archive, using these terms: “The Truth About the Drug Companies," "Drug War Capitalism," "Lost Connections" (Hari); "Dallas Buyers Club," "The Marijuana Manifesto" (Ventura); "American Made," "The Long, Strange Trip."  

The Cultural Marxist

September 8, 2023