Lawyers for three drug companies that won a California bench verdict last year in one of the first opioid trials in the nation referenced key themes in that decision in their opening statements on Monday in West Virginia.
Lawyers for Teva, Allergan and Janssen Pharmaceutical, in a bench trial in Charleston, West Virginia, argued that an oversupply of opioids did not prove they were liable for a public health crisis in the state. All three companies won a Nov. 1 decision in which a judge agreed, faulting three California counties and Oakland for failing to distinguish “medical inappropriate prescriptions” from legitimate ones in their own public nuisance case.
