
Pharmaceutical Executive Sentenced To 66 Months In Prison In Opioid Trial - anigbrowl
https://www.npr.org/2020/01/23/798973304/pharmaceutical-executive-john-kapoor-sentenced-to-66-months-in-prison-in-opioid-
======
jimbob45
"The sales executive hired a stripper as a Subsys sales representative to help
persuade doctors to boost prescriptions. The woman, named Sunrise Lee,
eventually was promoted to oversee a third of the company's sales force."

This is begging to be made into a movie.

~~~
hinkley
Executive Producers: Richard Gere and Julia Roberts

~~~
dvtrn
I’m gonna just go on a limb and guess that this was downvoted into the greys
by people who never saw the movie “Pretty Woman” where this was _very nearly_
the exact plot as the news story here and therefore completely missed the
irony:

It _was_ a movie.

~~~
blazespin
Not really.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pretty_Woman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pretty_Woman)

I have to say, simply because the woman was a stripper does not preclude her
from being an effective manager. Perhaps the article could have spent more
time talking about dubious moral and unethical things that she did rather than
her past history of removing her clothing.

Profiling like this is only necessary when your life is potentially in danger,
like being a cop in a dark alley. We're a modern society, can't we treat
everyone as individuals to be respected?

~~~
dvtrn
May I kindly suggest a watch of the movie versus a read of an abridged plot
from Wikipedia to see the associations I’ve drawn between this story and the
movie?

The parallels aren’t complete nor exhaustive but the way Gere’s character
repeatedly parlays his relationship with Roberts for professional and social
advantage (which is only one instance talked about in said wiki article) is
one of the more prevalent themes in the film I and presumably the commenter I
relied to are alluding to when connecting these dots of “art imitating life”.

This isn’t an ethical argument about how effective sex-workers are in non-sex
work careers but a critique of the power dynamics between two individuals. One
who merely happened to be a sex-worker.

~~~
blazespin
Julia Roberts was a prostitute which was an illegal job. Stripping is
generally not illegal.

I also don't recall anything in the movie about her managing anything, but
perhaps I missed that. It was quite awhile ago. And if I recall, she
encouraged Gere's character to act in a more honest manner.

Really, there seems to be very little connection here.

~~~
dvtrn
Again you seem to think I’m drawing the comparison as a way of making a value
judgement about sex work and those who engage in it.

 _That’s not what’s happening here_.

------
chooseaname
> "I didn't think of who we were at Insys and how unethical what we were doing
> was," he told the judge on Thursday, according to Bloomberg. "The only thing
> I could think was how could I keep up with the fast and furious pace
> necessary to get ahead."

Sadly, I think people really do get caught up in the pace and don’t think
about anything else. No excuse though.

------
hinkley
How many other people deserve to be right there with 'em?

There's this whole other version of the rat race / climbing the ladder that is
either new or I just didn't know about:

If you can be adjacent to the people who can be blamed for something, you get
to keep all the bonuses and not go to jail. Unless they find a way to blame
the whole thing on you.

~~~
cubano
You have to think this is mostly a political show trial, with the main
government players hoping to make a name for themselves for some future
enrichments yet to be named.

If as a side benefit, some execs think twice about pushing addictive pills to
people who want them, I suppose that is a good thing as well, but to see this
as much more then just a way for the prosecutor to "make hay" I feel misses
the point.

~~~
hinkley
Absolutely. What galls me though is that in 30 years, when prosecuting things
like this have long gone out of fashion, our grand kids will be having this
very same conversation.

------
chkaloon
"U.S. District Judge Allison Burroughs explained that she reached the lesser
sentence after considering Kapoor's advanced age and philanthropy" \- So if
you are going to hook people on your drugs, ruin their lives and make billions
off of them, as long as you give some of it away that makes it better. Uh, ok.

------
rjkennedy98
How is being old a reason for a short sentence. Is being young an excuse for a
longer sentence?

~~~
a3n
It's just one of many whiny tools in a lawyer's toolbox.

The irony being that all those dead opioid users didn't have the chance to be
old.

------
WheelsAtLarge
20+ yrs ago Pharma was pushing doctors to use opioids more liberally since the
manufactures said that they were safe for people that really needed it. Now we
see that that was a mistake.

I suspect that we are heading in the same direction with pot. In the future,
we will be looking back and wonder why we were not careful with the use of it.
I think it should be legal but it should not be treated like its use has no
consequences.

~~~
paulddraper
One difference: it's impossible to die (immediately) from marijuana.

Opiods? Yes.

Asprin? Uh huh.

Alcohol? Absolutely.

Like tobacco, week can be harm you, but only over a long period of time.

~~~
lokedhs
It may be that I'm not familiar with US English expressions, but it's not
clear to me if "Uh huh" means yes or no. Based on context my guess is "yes",
but I honestly don't know.

If I try to pronounce it to myself, I can do so with intonation that indicates
either.

I really don't like to be the guy who is nitpicking, but in an international
forum such as this it's helpful to be as clear as possible.

~~~
harimau777
"Uh huh" generally means "yes". However, I think what might be tripping you up
is that it is often used sarcastically to actually means "no".

In this case, I agree with you. It probably means "yes".

------
Koshkin
Why not the doctors?

~~~
Consultant32452
In the early 2000s my entire state was littered with "pain clinics" which were
just fronts for medically licensed drug dealers. Those are all gone now.

------
madengr
How in the hell did they charge $19k a month for fentanyl? The stuff is made
on the industrial scale in China.

------
Gatsky
Good. 5 years earlier would have saved lives.

If only they could go back and haul up all the tobacco executives from nursing
homes and golf courses and do the same.

------
chiefalchemist
Five years? All things considered? Lives ruined? Deaths? Etc.? Is a slap on
the pinky finger. It'll be a country club prison. Sentence will be reduced for
good behavior. Etc.

Better than nothing I suppose. But not by much.

~~~
banads
It's definitely disproportionate to what a street level dealer typically gets
for pushing an extremely small fraction of opiods relative to what these
people were doing.

~~~
chiefalchemist
Right. He did the work of multiple dealers and got a fraction of the
punishment. Evidently the criminal justice system has two problems. The
victims and the loopholers.

------
enjoyyourlife
"U.S. District Judge Allison Burroughs..."

She's judged quite a few notable other rulings such as putting a hold on
Trump's travel ban and the Harvard lawsuit

------
vearwhershuh
It's a start.

Now do the Sacklers.

~~~
ryan-allen
Is there any chance of that happening? This bloke is a "former billionaire",
as opposed to a current one.

~~~
elfexec
Also this bloke was a "Kapoor". So he probably had very little political
clout/connections and was simply targeted for convenience and used as a
sacrificial lamb to placate the masses. The Sackler's are cash
multibillionaires ( not stock billionaires ) and they have strong politicals
connections in the NY area, etc.

This case reminds me in some way of the Abacus trial. The only financial
institution to be tried for the financial crisis was a small local bank
founded by a "Sung".

[https://www.marketplace.org/2017/05/22/abacus-only-bank-
char...](https://www.marketplace.org/2017/05/22/abacus-only-bank-charged-
financial-crisis/)

You could watch a documentary about the case.

[https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/film/abacus/](https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/film/abacus/)

The Kapoor case, like the Sung case, is really a show trial.

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dpflan
Title typo to fix: "eecutive" \--> "executive"

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maxfan8
There is a typo in the title.

------
planetzero
This is a blow for anyone wanting to 'legalize all drugs'.

~~~
theonemind
I don't think so, except inasmuch as confirmation bias will lead anyone with
an anti-legalize-drugs bias to construe this as evidence for that position.

The incentives for these actions can come in part from artificially high
prices. More legalization gets you more players, and could perhaps dilute the
power to use the machinery of doctors, drug companies, etc. as a top-down drug
pushing force.

Additionally, society tends to build up immunity with exposure. You can get
more irrational behaviors with highly controlled or scarce things. In the
short term, introducing a lot of free/legalized drugs into an already
constrained society could increase damage, but for the long term? Not such a
clear picture, in my opinion. Perhaps a slow loosing to allow society to
adapt.

Honestly, I see very little here to make this a blow against legalizing drugs
besides confirmation bias for those already against it.

It also leaves out the cost of the war on drugs, which you would, in a
rational analysis, need to compare against the cost/problems of legalization,
as the cost/problems of the war on drugs go down. Which one costs more?
Organized crime takes a serious hit with legalization, a secondary benefit.
Consider Prohibition in the United States. Alcohol's a drug, actually a fairly
destructive one. Why did they repeal it?

~~~
planetzero
"Honestly, I see very little here to make this a blow against legalizing drugs
besides confirmation bias for those already against it."

I don't see Budweiser execs going to prison for selling alcohol that resulted
in someone become addicted or killing someone in an accident...which is most
likely killing many more people per year than any other drug.

"Organized crime takes a serious hit with legalization"

This one has been proven false with MJ legalization. In California, for
instance, legalization has only gotten more people interested in using and
then when they realize they can get it for cheaper on the illegal market, it's
put many legal shops out of business.

With legalization comes higher prices (and possibly shortages and the
inability to get it whenever you want). As a result, it has really done
nothing to curb organized crime or illegal sales.

This was only my theory before it was legalized, and now it has been proven
correct. I guess drug users don't really care about paying their fair share.

This was from a year ago, but things haven't changed much:

[https://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-ca-gavin-newsom-
crac...](https://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-ca-gavin-newsom-crackdown-
pot-black-market-20190219-story.html)

"Consider Prohibition in the United States. Alcohol's a drug, actually a
fairly destructive one. Why did they repeal it?"

It only worked because they stamped out corruption and killed/jailed all of
the organized criminals involved in the illegal booze business.

With drugs, it's already gotten too big. The corruption in Mexico is at
another level. The cartels run the country. The illegal market will never go
away, especially since they don't have to deal with regulations and can
provide a cheaper product (which will always be the case).

~~~
thaumasiotes
> With legalization comes higher prices (and possibly shortages and the
> inability to get it whenever you want).

This isn't actually a feature of legalizing trade in something. If you're just
contrasting "legal drug sales" with "illegal drug sales", the illegal vendor
has much, much higher costs and isn't in a position to charge lower prices.

But California chose to impose ludicrously high compliance costs on the legal
vendors, so high that illegal vendors can effortlessly beat them on price.

~~~
planetzero
"The illegal vendor has much, much higher costs and isn't in a position to
charge lower prices."

I disagree. Illegal vendors don't have to follow labor laws (they can get much
cheaper labor), regulations (they aren't limited by the rules imposed by their
state/city), and taxation (they aren't paying extra taxes on top of their
current costs).

All of these equal lower prices. The legal market will almost never be able to
complete with the illegal market, for these very reasons.

"But California chose to impose ludicrously high compliance costs on the legal
vendors,"

We were told that when MJ was legalized, all illegal vendors would go away and
the state would see a boost in tax revenue. Where do you think this extra tax
revenue comes from?

Don't drug users want to pay their 'fair share' That I keep hearing about? The
reality is they don't really care about paying any taxes and just want their
drugs at the cheapest price. The current state of illegal sales clearly shows
this.

------
untilHellbanned
Great. Now do zuckerberg. Perhaps inarguably more mass destruction.

~~~
etrk
> "Perhaps inarguably"

Two words you rarely see together.

