The Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing today on the controversial plea in which Purdue Pharma and three execs admitted to fraudulently marketing OxyContin, and Rudy Giuliani's name came up a couple of times.
Giuliani acted as a consultant, image-builder and lawyer for Purdue from 2002 through last year, and helped negotiate the plea deal, which has been criticized by relatives of some victims because none of the execs got jail time, and the company didn't have to disgorge all of its profits.
Sid Wolfe, director of Public Citizen's Health Research Group (prepared a statement): "Why are there no manslaughter charges, no jail sentences and such relatively low amounts of financial penalties? Is it perhaps because Purdue has the money to hire Rudy Giuliani and the best white collar criminal defense lawyers to minimize the damage to itself and its executives? If this does not represent a double standard of justice, what does?
Marianne Skolek, whose daughter died after taking the drug, made reference in her prepared statement to a consulting contract Giuliani had with the Drug Enforcement Administration, which polices prescription drug abuse, at the same time he was working for Purdue: "I want to know how Rudy Guliani could be the “big star” hired by Purdue Pharma to play down the abuse and diversion of OxyContin and also get paid by the DEA for work performed for them."
U.S. Atty. John Brownlee of Virginia, who prosecuted the case, defended the plea deal and never mentioned Giuliani in his prepared statement. But he made it clear that from the first subpoena Purdue lawyers, unnamed, didn't make it easy to bring their client to justice:
"That subpoena, and the nearly 600 that followed over the next several years, represented the beginning of a difficult struggle between Purdue’s counsel and the government for the necessary information we needed to conduct our review. Purdue’s counsel fought hard and did the very best to protect the requested information and records. "