WASHINGTON (Legal Newsline) – Warner Chilcott U.S. Sales LLC, a subsidiary of pharmaceutical manufacturer Warner Chilcott PLC, has agreed to plead guilty to felony health care fraud scheme charges.
This came as part of a global settlement with the United States. The company will pay $125 million to resolve its criminal and civil liability. It had allegedly illegally marketed the drugs Actonel, Asacol, Atelvia, Doryx, Enablex, Estrace and Loestrin. The illegal scheme allegedly involved paying kickbacks to physicians throughout the country to get them to prescribe its drugs.
“The Justice Department is committed to protecting the integrity of physician prescribing decisions and ensuring that financial arrangements in the health care marketplace comply with the law,” Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Benjamin C. Mizer, head of the Justice Department’s Civil Division, said. “The Department will continue to hold companies and responsible individuals accountable when they use improper incentives, like those alleged here, to promote their products.”
The U.S. Attorney’s Office of the District of Massachusetts and the Civil Division’s Consumer Protection branch handled the criminal case. The U.S. Attorney’s Office of the District of Massachusetts and the Civil Division’s Commercial Litigation Branch handled the civil case.