For families, $6 billion deal with OxyContin maker is just a start

Lynn Wencus, of Wrentham, Mass., holds a poster, with a likeness of her son Jeff, at her home, in Wrentham, Wednesday, March 2, 2022. Wencus lost her son to a heroin overdose in 2017. OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma and virtually all U.S. states have agreed to a new settlement of opioid lawsuits. The deal reached Thursday, March 3, 2022, would require members of the Sackler family who own the drugmaker to pay $5.5 billion to $6 billion in cash. They also apologized. A bankruptcy judge must still approve the deal. (AP Photo/Steven Senne) Lynn Wencus, of Wrentham, Mass., holds a poster, with a likeness of her son Jeff, at her home, in Wrentham, Wednesday, March 2, 2022. Wencus lost her son to a heroin overdose in 2017. OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma and virtually all U.S. states have agreed to a new settlement of opioid lawsuits. The deal reached Thursday, March 3, 2022, would require members of the Sackler family who own the drugmaker to pay $5.5 billion to $6 billion in cash. They also apologized. A bankruptcy judge must still approve the deal. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)

By JOHN SEEWER and DAVE COLLINS / The Associated Press March 4, 2022 6 min read

For those who lost loved ones in the opioid crisis, making sure the family behind OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma paid a price was never just about money. What many wanted was a chance to confront the Sackler family face to face, to make them feel their pain.

While some may get that chance – at least by video – under a tentative settlement reached Thursday that also would force the Sacklers to pay out billions, the families still are coming away feeling empty, conflicted and angry yet again. There’s a bit of hope mixed in, too.

Nothing, though, will bring back any of the lives lost or hold the Sacklers fully accountable, in their eyes.

“I’d like to see the Sacklers bleed all they can, but the bigger picture for me is what they’re doing to clean up the mess,” said Vicki Meyer Bishop of Clarksburg, Maryland, who lost her 45-year-old son, Brian Meyer, in 2017. “We’re all so very worried about the next generation and the next child who will be lost.”

The Sacklers, whose wealth has been estimated in court filings at over $10 billion, will get to hang on to a chunk of their vast fortune and be protected from current and future civil lawsuits over opioids.