Brick Expected To File Lawsuit Against Opioid Manufacturers

BRICK, NJ — Brick Township officials are expected to approve an agreement Tuesday for the township to file a lawsuit against the pharmaceutical companies that manufacture opioid painkillers, joining other municipalities across the country that are seeking compensation for the toll the opioid crisis has taken on their communities.

Brick Township Mayor John Ducey announced the plan to file suit Thursday in a news release.

The agreement the Township Council will be asked to approve Tuesday night will engage the national law firm of Motley Rice, LLC, to represent the township in the lawsuit.

Under the terms of the agreement, the law firm will not receive any payment from the township but will instead take a percentage of any recovery from the drug manufacturers, the news release said.

Motley Rice LLC is the same law firm Toms River agreed to hire in August to file a similar lawsuit. The law firm is representing the states of South Carolina, Alaska and New Hampshire, the city of Chicago, Albany County, New York, and Summit County, Ohio, all of which are battling epidemic levels of opioid and heroin abuse. Washington State joined the lawsuit effort in September. Santa Clara County in California filed the first complaint, in 2013.

Motley Rice attorneys gained recognition for their pioneering asbestos lawsuits, their work with states in the landmark litigation against Big Tobacco, and their representation of 9/11 families in the ongoing lawsuit against terrorist financiers.

“While we will continue our efforts to attack the heroin problem through treatment and aggressive law enforcement, we also will hold the manufacturers accountable for telling doctors and patients that opioids are not addictive. They know that’s not true.”

Purdue Pharma, the manufacturer of OxyContin, paid $635 million in fines in 2007 after pleading guilty to charges of false marketing brought by the Department of Justice, a Forbes report said. The company also settled a lawsuit in 2015 with the state of Kentucky over “illegally misrepresented and/or concealed the highly addictive nature of OxyContin and encouraged doctors who weren’t trained in pain management to overprescribe the opioid pain reliever to Kentucky patients,” Forbes reported.

Ducey noted that drug overdoses in Ocean County have steadily increased; the Ocean County prosecutor's office says the number of overdose deaths rose from 69 in 2014 to 212 in 2016.

The number of overdose deaths so far in 2017 is 105 countywide as of the end of September, the prosecutor's office has said.

The decline in deaths is a direct result of the efforts on education, enforcement and rehabilitation, Ducey said.

The township police department was one of the first two in the county to offer the Blue HART (Heroin Addiction Recovery & Treatment) program, where addicts seeking help can go to the police station and, in most cases, be admitted into treatment.

The police department also has set up a drug enforcement unit to pursue dealers, while a ommunity policing unit educates children and the public about the dangers of opioid use, he said.

“We need to use every option at our disposal to fight this horrific battle," Ducey said. "I am pleased that
Motley Rice will bring its national legal expertise to our town, at no cost to our residents.”

“The council joins the mayor in this effort against the opioid manufacturers," Council President Arthur Halloran said. "These drugs have unfortunately destroyed many lives across our nation and right here in
Brick.”

“We will continue this fight against heroin and opioid drugs for as long as it takes,”
Ducey said. “This lawsuit is an important step in the effort to end this scourge.”

Photo by Karen Wall, Patch staff