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Drug company leaders should face prosecution, Oregon official says

William Theobald, USA Today 12:12 p.m. PST February 23, 2016

WASHINGTON – Drug company executives should be prosecuted for improper actions that contribute to the growth of opioid addiction, an Oregon assistant attorney general told a Senate committee Tuesday.

“We have to have more personal accountability of the executives who make these decisions,” David Hart testified at a hearing of the Senate Finance Committee on the opioid addiction epidemic. “They can’t walk away with their stock options and their salaries.”

Hart, head of the Oregon attorney general’s health fraud unit, has led several investigations into improper marketing and promotion practices by pharmaceutical companies that make the highly addictive painkillers.

In response to questions from Sen. Ron Wyden, the ranking Democrat on the committee, Hart also said the companies should be required to forfeit the profit they earn from their improper actions.

“We need to have these companies help clean up the messes they make,” Hart said.

He cited the state’s investigation of Insys, the maker of a painkiller called Subsys. Investigators alleged the company provided “improper financial incentives” to doctors to increase prescriptions, promoted the drug to doctors not qualified to prescribe it, and deceptively promoted its use for mild pain.

The company agreed to a voluntary settlement last August that included a $1.1 million payment, which Hart said amounted to two times its sales of the drug in the state of Oregon. The money is being used to fight opioid addiction.

Hart also was involved in a 2007 settlement among Oregon and 26 other state attorneys general and Purdue Pharma, after the company was accused of misrepresenting OxyContin’s risk of addiction.

Wyden said one common theme he heard during public meetings in Oregon last week on opioid abuse was a phenomenon he dubbed the “prescription pendulum.”

In past years, he said, doctors were criticized for not being aggressive enough in prescribing medication to manage severe pain. Now, the issue has swung the other way and doctors are being criticized for overprescribing pain killers.

Oregon ranked fourth among states in the rate of abuse of prescription painkillers, according to a 2013-2014 survey by the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. That’s down from first among the states in the same 2010-2011 survey.

Between 2000 and 2013, there were 2,226 deaths in Oregon due to opioid overdoses. While the overdose death rate has dropped in recent years, in 2013 it was still nearly three times the rate in 2000.

“This epidemic is carving a path of destruction through communities all across the country,” Wyden said.

He said he worries policymakers are splitting into opposing camps: one focused on increasing enforcement and the other favoring more resources for treatment.

“What’s needed is a better approach that includes three things: more prevention, better treatment, and tougher enforcement,” Wyden said. “True success will require all three to work in tandem.”

The committee is expected to take up legislation soon that would allow for people in the Medicare program who are identified as at-risk for opioid addiction to be placed in a special program under which all of their prescriptions would be handled by one doctor and/or one pharmacy. Opioid abusers often will obtain multiple prescriptions for the painkillers.

In 2013, 3.6 million prescriptions for opioid painkillers were dispensed in Oregon, enough for nearly one prescription for every resident.

Baton Rouge woman arrested in ‘Russian Mafia’ threat over home remodeling dispute

Tammy Lyn Bean

Feds confirm civil rights investigation into Waukegan District 60

Officials with the U.S. Department of Education have confirmed that its Office for Civil Rights is investigating complaints against Waukegan Public School District 60, including allegations of racial discrimination in both discipline matters and sexual harassment protections.

Local activist Chris “Brotha” Blanks, who founded the Black Abolition Movement for the Mind in Waukegan, reported earlier this month that he filed a set of complaints against the district in October and was informed in December that an investigation would take place.

While an official with the department’s Chicago office said he was not authorized to comment following Blanks’ announcement, a Department of Education spokesman said in a Feb. 17 statement that an investigation was opened on Dec. 14 and no timeline or estimated date of completion could be reported. The spokesman added that “because this is an open investigation, (the Office for Civil Rights) cannot provide further details or case-specific information.”

In general, the statement added, the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) investigates issues of racial discrimination in the administration of discipline and also in differential treatment, denial of benefits, exclusion or retaliation as covered under Title VI, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, and national origin in programs and activities receiving federal financial assistance. Also investigated are alleged sexual violence issues related to Title IX, the federal law that guarantees female students protection from discrimination and sexual harassment.

Information on the complaints released by Blanks accuse the district of subjecting African-American and Hispanic students to exclusionary discipline “more frequently and for less serious offenses than white students.” A separate complaint claims the district fails to “promptly and equitably respond to complaints, reports and/or incidents of sexual harassment, including sexual violence.”

Regarding how such investigations proceed and what penalties might be involved, the Department of Education statement said policy dictates that an investigator serves as “a neutral fact-finder” in gathering information through data requests, interviews and site visits.

“It should be noted that the opening of an investigation by OCR in itself does not indicate that the institution is violating or has violated any federal law or that OCR has reached a conclusion as to whether a violation of any federal law exists,” the statement added. “As part of its investigation process, OCR gathers information through a variety of methods to determine if a school or district is meeting its obligations to comply with the civil rights laws that OCR enforces.

“OCR analyzes all relevant evidence from the parties involved in the case to develop its findings. At the conclusion of the investigation of all issues, OCR will determine if the evidence supports a conclusion of noncompliance or if the evidence is insufficient.”

Districts found to have broken a law and refused to address the problems can lose federal funding or be referred to the U.S. Department of Justice for unspecified further action, according to the statement.

“Where the office finds that a violation has occurred, OCR works with the institution to reach a resolution agreement,” the statement added. “All resolutions are case-specific and fact-dependent. Through these agreements with schools, OCR has been able to attain strong remedies without the need to initiate enforcement actions, either through the initiation of an administrative hearing to terminate federal funding or a referral to the Department of Justice for judicial relief.

“However, initiating proceedings to revoke federal funds is a tool that OCR will utilize, if necessary, to achieve compliance.”

District 60 officials acknowledged in a statement released earlier this month that they had begun cooperating with the investigation.

“We are currently working to fulfill the Office of Civil Rights’ request for numerous documents and records, which will be used in the OCR’s investigation,” the Feb. 10 statement read. “As we work to comply with these requests we, unfortunately, cannot comment further.”

danmoran@tribpub.com

Twitter @NewsSunDanMoran

Copyright © 2016, Lake County News-Sun

Apple’s clash with the FBI will be a tough legal fight

BY SERGIO HERNANDEZ & CHRISTINA WARREN

Apple may face an uphill climb in its latest fight with the feds over digital privacy.

The company’s CEO, Tim Cook, said in a statement on its website Wednesday that Apple opposes a federal court’s order to write special software so federal investigators can penetrate the passcode for an iPhone once used by Syed Farook.

Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, were the perpetrators of a shooting spree in San Bernardino, Calif., on Dec. 2, which killed 14 people and injured 22 others. The shooters were later killed during a gunfight with police.

Agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and lawyers from the Justice Department have said Farook’s phone, and iPhone 5C, may contain key evidence about his communications in the weeks before the attack, but they cannot access it without Farook’s passcode.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Sheri Pym issued the Apple order on Tuesday, after the local U.S. Attorney petitioned a federal court for Apple’s help.

FBI agents have been unable to access the phone’s contents because of security features built into the device’s software. Those include one that forces users to wait several minutes before entering different passcodes. Another erases a decryption key necessary to access the device’s data if a user enters a wrong passcode too frequently.

The judge’s order instructs Apple to write custom software, called a “Software Image File,” to bypass these security features so the FBI can quickly test an unlimited number of passcodes until it finds the right one. Once that as-yet-uncreated software is installed on the phone, security experts say it would take no more than a day to find the code.

News of the order triggered fierce debate last week as technologists wondered whether Apple can, as a matter of technical ability, comply with the demand, while privacy advocates said engineering such software could have dangerous security implications. Legal experts said it raises constitutional questions about how far the government can go when conscripting private, third parties to assist with law enforcement.

Cook’s statement, which indicated the company planned to fight the order in court, prompted the Justice Department to file a new motion on Friday, asking Pym to compel Apple to comply with her previous order.

Read Full Article – http://mashable.com/2016/02/21/apple-fbi-legal-issues/#Im3rLfAR_iq9