MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
A few minutes ago, the Supreme Court overturned the Purdue Pharma bankruptcy ruling that would have given immunity from opioid lawsuits to members of the Sackler family. The Sacklers own the private company that made and sold Oxycontin, which helped to spur America's overdose crisis. The 5-4 opinion overturns a deal that would have provided between 6 and $8 billion in financial relief to communities and victims of Oxycontin. NPR's Brian Mann is with us now to tell us more about it. Good morning, Brian.
BRIAN MANN, BYLINE: Hi, Michel.
MARTIN: So this opinion was written by Justice Neil Gorsuch. Why did he overturn the deal?
MANN: Well, what the Justice wrote is basically the Congress has never given federal bankruptcy courts this kind of power. He said that essentially what this ruling - this deal would have done is forced thousands of people to give up lawsuits against the Sacklers against their will. The Sacklers are themselves not bankrupt. They've never filed for bankruptcy. And so what the Justice wrote - Justice Gorsuch wrote that if Congress wanted to give bankruptcy courts this kind of power, they could have done so, but it's just not currently in the law.
MARTIN: Interesting that Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who was one of the Conservatives like Neil Gorsuch who was appointed by President Trump wrote for the dissent, calling this opinion, quote, "wrong on the law and devastating for more than 100,000 opioid victims and their families," unquote. What is his argument?
MANN: Well, I think one thing Michel, that is interesting in what you noted, is that this ruling - this opinion does not break down on ideological lines. We knew that the justices were really wrestling with this. Basically, what Justice Kavanaugh says is that this takes away a key tool of bankruptcy courts to force this kind of deal to kind of reach resolution of complicated cases. And he also makes the point that, in this case, billions of dollars in relief that would have gone to communities and also to individual victims of Oxycontin, that money will not now flow, and it's unclear exactly, you know, when any money from the Sacklers or Purdue Pharma will now reach victims.
MARTIN: This ruling is also expected to affect the U.S. bankruptcy system. How?
MANN: Well, this is really interesting, Michel. What we've seen over the last several years is that the Sacklers - remember, not bankrupt - they are not alone in trying to use bankruptcy court to limit their liability. We've seen a lot of other major corporations, including Johnson & Johnson, try to use similar bankruptcy maneuvers, try to create systems that allow them to cap their liability and shut down lawsuits against them. Essentially, what we've seen in this opinion is a real firewall against a lot of that behavior. This is really going to change the way a lot of litigation happens not just in the opioid space, but in environmental cases, in cases involving product liability. This is a big shock wave moment.
MARTIN: I think, Brian, if you would, I think in the time we have left, I think it would be helpful if you could remind us of the role of Purdue Pharma and the Sacklers in a context of the opioid crisis, something that you cover very closely.
MANN: Yeah, this was really a moment with the Sacklers and their company Purdue Pharma marketing aggressively Oxycontin as a safer alternative - an opioid that could be used more widely in the medical space. This really opened the door to the medical industry adopting opioids. And most experts agree that this was a big factor in sparring a kind of public health crisis that's killed more than 1 million people and continues now with the fentanyl crisis to kill more than 100,000 people a year. A lot of people said giving members of the Sackler family immunity would have been a blow to justice. Now, it appears that lawsuits against them individually can move forward again.
MARTIN: That is NPR's Brian Mann. He is NPR addiction correspondent. Brian, thank you.
MANN: Thank you, Michel.
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