“GlaxoSmithKline LLC will pay $3 billion ...”
Who receives this payment? How much goes to lawyers?
From Glaxo in $3 Billion Settlement - WSJ (sub), by Jeanne Whalen, Devlin Barrett and Peter Loftus, 2012 July 02
Under the deal, which requires court approval, Glaxo will plead guilty to criminal charges involving three drugs — the antidepressants Paxil and Wellbutrin and the diabetes drug Avandia. The settlement includes $1 billion in criminal fines and $2 billion to resolve civil liabilities owed to the federal government and the states, the Justice Department said. Glaxo had announced the settlement's size in November. The guilty plea covers a range of behavior by the U.K.-based company, including illegally promoting the antidepressants in the U.S. for uses that weren't approved by the Food and Drug Administration, a practice known as off-label marketing, and withholding important safety data about Avandia from the U.S. regulator. The settlement was Glaxo's fourth with the U.S. government in the past several years but is by far its costliest and most far-reaching. Over a period of more than a decade, the government's latest investigation found, the company plied doctors with perks such as free spa treatments, Colorado ski trips, pheasant-hunting jaunts to Europe and Madonna concert tickets, Justice Department officials said. Meanwhile, it encouraged those doctors to write prescriptions for the two antidepressants that went beyond their sanctioned uses. U.S. law bars companies from marketing a drug for uses not approved by the Food and Drug Administration, though doctors may prescribe approved drugs as they see fit. ..... < snip > Drug maker GlaxoSmithKline PLC agreed to plead guilty to criminal charges of illegally marketing drugs and withholding safety data from U.S. regulators, and to pay $3 billion to the government in what the Justice Department called the largest health-care fraud settlement in U.S. history.
Pheasant-hunting jaunts and tickets to Madonna concerts? That SHOULD BE criminal.
Oh, about the settlement's fines, money... The money goes to DoJ and SAOs... Sorry, Charlie... and Joan Q. Public. No real harm was done to the consumers, just "illegal marketing" of product "not approved by FDA."