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Oxycontin maker Purdue Pharma on Friday asked the U.S. Supreme Court to reject the U.S. Department of Justice's request to delay its multi-billion-dollar bankruptcy settlement resolving thousands of lawsuits against it over the opioid epidemic, Reuters reported.The department's bankruptcy watchdog last week asked the Supreme Court to pause the settlement, which would shield the company's Sackler family owners from opioid lawsuits in exchange for a $6 billion contribution to a broader settlement with states, local governments and victims of addiction. The Department of Justice (DOJ) asked the high court to put the deal on hold after a federal appeals court rejected a proposed delay. Purdue on Friday argued that a delay would be destructive, imperiling a settlement that has the support of all major stakeholders, including state attorneys general and people affected by the opioid crisis. The DOJ's position would "take billions of dollars out of opioid abatement programs that are sorely needed" and potentially "deprive victims of any meaningful recovery" if the deal falls apart, Purdue's lawyers wrote. That position was echoed by a group representing 60,000 people who have filed personal injury opioid claims in Purdue's bankruptcy.

The Archdiocese of San Francisco will "very likely" file for bankruptcy in order to deal with a wave of lawsuits alleging child sexual abuse by its priests and other employees and volunteers going back decades, the archbishop said, according to a Los Angeles Times report. In an open letter on Friday, Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone said the option was the result of "much contemplation and prayer" and arose from discussions with lawyers and financial advisors. More than 500 civil lawsuits alleging abuse were filed against the Catholic archdiocese between 2020 and 2022, when California temporarily lifted the statute of limitations on such allegations against churches and other institutions. Cordileone said that filing for chapter 11 bankruptcy would allow the archdiocese "to deal with the hundreds of cases collectively rather than one at a time" and "reorganize its financial affairs to continue its vital ministries to the faithful and to the communities that rely on our services and charity." The archdiocese would not be the first in California to take such action. Bankruptcy has been filed or mulled by dioceses across the state, including in Oakland, Santa Rosa, Sacramento and San Diego.

Alex Mashinsky, the founder and former chief of the now-bankrupt cryptocurrency lender Celsius Network, must face a lawsuit by New York Attorney General Letitia James accusing him of civil fraud, a Manhattan state court judge ruled on Friday, Reuters reported. Justice Margaret Chan said the attorney general sufficiently alleged that Mashinsky defrauded investors by touting Celsius as a safe alternative to banks and concealing its risks, including hundreds of millions of dollars of investment losses. Judge Chan also said James could pursue some claims under the Martin Act, a powerful state securities law, and that the "earned interest accounts" that Celsius offered customers qualified as securities under state law. The attorney general's lawsuit "supports a reasonable inference that the harm suffered by investors flowed, at least in part, from Mashinsky's alleged misrepresentations made in New York concerning Celsius' overall financial health and investment safety," Chan wrote in a 25-page decision.

Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd has agreed to pay up to $126 million to U.S. hospitals over 18 years to settle claims that its marketing of opioid drugs raised the hospitals' operating costs, Reuters reported. As part of the proposed settlement, disclosed in Teva's quarterly earnings statement Wednesday, the Israel-based drugmaker also agreed to supply $49 million of the anti-overdose drug naloxone. Teva said that it had been sued by about 500 U.S. hospitals and other health care providers over opioids, and that the settlement would only be finalized if the company was satisfied that enough hospitals agreed to take part. Litigation against drugmakers, pharmacies and distributors over opioids, mostly brought by state, local and Native American tribal governments, has already resulted in more than $50 billion in total settlements, including a $4.35 billion settlement Teva reached last year.

Johnson & Johnson and a committee of cancer victims have agreed to speed up a court appeal of their fight regarding whether the health-care giant can use bankruptcy to end as many as 100,000 talc-related claims, Bloomberg News reported. The move could cut months off the appeals process. The first time the two sides fought about the issue, it took about a year and resulted in the bankruptcy case being dismissed. Now, J&J intends to appeal a decision by US Bankruptcy Judge Michael Kaplan to throw out the insolvency case of LTL Management, the unit the company created in order to try to resolve tens of thousands of cancer lawsuits. With Judge Kaplan gearing up to likely sign a final order dismissing the bankruptcy case next week — for the second time — both J&J and the committee of cancer victims want the federal appeals court to take up the matter. The cancer lawsuits have been on hold since J&J put LTL into bankruptcy for the first time in 2021. After that case was dismissed, J&J struck a deal with tens of thousands of claimants and put LTL back into bankruptcy, only to have that case struck down as well.

A number of prescription opioid manufacturers, including OxyContin developer Purdue Pharma and generics maker Mallinckrodt, have agreed to pay billions to settle lawsuits accusing the companies of fueling a drug abuse crisis in the U.S. The money they agreed to pay was meant to help communities fight opioid addiction and cover rehabilitation costs for individuals, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. Three of those settlements are at risk of falling apart or being substantially reworked, putting more than $8 billion of settlement money intended for addiction victims and governments in jeopardy. The drug manufacturers in particular faced charges of deceptive marketing practices, as companies like Purdue told the public that less than 1% of patients became addicted to their opioid pills, although internal company correspondence revealed that they knew that the risk of addiction was in fact much higher. Purdue Pharma’s settlement is also at risk. The drugmaker and tens of thousands of addiction victims, state governments and municipalities last year reached a global settlement that includes a $6 billion contribution that Purdue’s owners, the Sackler family, agreed to pay. In July, however, the federal government filed an appeal to the Supreme Court to review the settlement, suggesting that the inclusion of legal waivers for the family members may not conform with U.S. law. If the justices agree to hear the case, it could take until the end of next year for a decision to be made on whether the releases are legally permissible, and even longer for funds to be distributed. If the Supreme Court decides that the Sacklers can’t get releases under their plan, it is possible the whole settlement will have to be reworked and renegotiated.

The Second Circuit on July 25 denied the request of the government to stay issuance of the mandate pending the U.S. Solicitor General’s petition for certiorari asking the Supreme Court to review the Purdue decision allowing the bankruptcy court to issue nonconsensual releases of creditors’ direct claims against nondebtors. The mandate from the Second Circuit is scheduled to issue today, allowing the Purdue debtor to consummate the chapter 11 plan originally confirmed by the bankruptcy court in New York in September 2021, according to a special analysis from Rochelle's Daily Wire. The government isn’t giving up. The Solicitor General filed an application in the Supreme Court on July 28, asking the high court to stay issuance of the mandate pending disposition of the government’s forthcoming certiorari petition. The Supreme Court immediately directed that responses be filed by noon on Friday, August 4. The response deadline suggests that a grant or denial of a stay could come as early as Friday afternoon.

The Buffalo (N.Y.) Diocese faces more pressure to make a deal with child sex abuse survivors after Catholic dioceses in Rochester and Syracuse recently took major steps toward exiting their chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings, according to legal experts, the Buffalo News reported. The Syracuse Diocese announced on Thursday that it will pay abuse victims at least $100 million, and possibly more, through insurance funds, while Rochester last week negotiated a new deal with victims that now includes some insurance money, and would pay at least $126 million toward a settlement. The proposed deals in Rochester and Syracuse still must be approved by a vote of victim creditors and confirmed by a federal bankruptcy judge, but they provide the Buffalo Diocese with a potential path forward in resolving what has been a lengthy and arduous reorganization effort now in its 40th month. Mediated talks between the Buffalo Diocese and abuse survivors are ongoing, although the status of the negotiations is unclear because the parties are bound by a gag order.