NEW PORT RICHEY -- The state's civil trial against the Walgreens drugstore company is underway in a Pasco County courtroom.
Plaintiffs lawyers for the Florida Attorney General's Office asserted that Walgreens sent huge orders of opioids to stores without investigating. "Walgreens had a duty to make sure the opioids in its possession were only used for legitimate purposes," the state said.
The state asserted that many of Walgreens' sales went to drug dealers, who completed their deals in Walgreens parking lots. There were also incidents of robberies with opioids as the target. One state witness: the police chief of Oviedo, near Orlando, who is expected to testify that he wrote letters to Walgreens executives about the problems in his community, to no avail.
The AG's office said Walgreens sent 2.2 million doses of oxycodone to a Walgreens store in Hudson, which had 12,000 people at the time, or 2,000 doses for every resident of the community.
The state asserted that Walgreens did not respond to startling rises in opioid sales, but only responded when sales dropped off.
Attorney General Ashley Moody was in the courtroom, watching the trial.
In his opening statement, Walgreens attorney Steve Derringer reminded jurors that opioids are approved to treat pain by the Food and Drug Administration, and that not every use of an opioid is bad. In response to the state, Derringer insisted that the drugstore chain has had a "Good Faith Dispensing" policy since at least 1998, with pharmacists warned not to dispense an opioid if they saw one of seven red flags. He also quoted from statements made by the Attorney General's Office when Pam Bondi was attorney general that identified drug manufacturers, particularly Purdue Pharma, and "pill mills" caused the opioid epidemic.
Derringer said the state of Florida had no legislation to control pill mills before 2010, despite calls from Dave Aronberg, then in the state Attorney General's office, to restrict practices such as doctor shopping. He also said that many of the millions of prescriptions labeled "red flags" by prosecutors, really aren't. The state and defense are expected to present dueling experts on that topic.
Walgreens is the only major pharmacy chain that did not come to a settlement with the state.
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