The underlying dispute involves allegations by the attorneys general of most U.S. states and several territories that thirty-six pharmaceutical companies and executives conspired to fix prices, allocate markets, and rig bids across dozens of generic drug products. The case, Connecticut v. Sandoz, Inc., No. 3:20-cv-00802, was originally filed in the District of Connecticut, transferred to the Eastern District of Pennsylvania for MDL proceedings, and remanded back to Judge Michael P. Shea in April 2024.
The Phenytoin claim centers on Amneal's conduct in the spring and summer of 2014 involving Phenytoin Sodium Extended-Release, an epilepsy drug that Amneal considered both a "premium" and "complex" product to manufacture. Amneal was experiencing significant supply problems and failure-to-supply penalties at the time, and its executives internally discussed discontinuing the product or shedding either Walgreens or Walmart as a customer. The states contend that instead of acting unilaterally, Amneal colluded with Taro, Mylan, and Sun to raise prices while retaining both major customers.
Judge Shea held that a reasonable jury could find conspiracy based on the combination of parallel price increases — Taro on June 2, Mylan's internal approval on June 18, Amneal on June 23, and Sun on July 14, 2014 — and a high level of interfirm phone calls between Amneal's Shannon Rivero and Edward Lowther and their counterparts at Mylan and Taro, clustered tightly around each pricing decision. The court noted that Rivero's June 2 email to Lowther stating she hoped Mylan would see Taro's price increase, Lowther's reply that they would follow, and Lowther's subsequent calls to Mylan's Jim Nesta that same evening were particularly significant. The court also drew on Fifth Amendment invocations by representatives of Taro, Mylan, and Sun — including when asked directly whether they had reached agreements with Amneal on Phenytoin pricing and customer allocation — as supporting an adverse inference against Amneal.
On the overarching conspiracy, however, Judge Shea granted summary judgment for Amneal, finding the evidence weaker than what he had seen with respect to co-defendant Aurobindo, which he had previously allowed to proceed to trial on the broader claim. Key distinctions: no Amneal employee brokered anticompetitive agreements between other defendants on drugs beyond Phenytoin, no Amneal employee pleaded guilty or entered a deferred prosecution agreement, and testimony from Amneal's own executives described "fair share" as a market data point rather than a conspiratorial norm — a characterization an employee at rival Glenmark corroborated by describing Amneal as "very, very aggressive when it came to market share." The states' argument that Taro's DPA with the Department of Justice — covering customer allocation and price-fixing from approximately March 2013 to December 2015 — should be read broadly against Amneal did not persuade the court, which noted the DPA speaks to Taro's conduct and does not mention Phenytoin explicitly.
The ruling is the latest in a series of defendant-specific summary judgment decisions by Judge Shea in the remanded MDL cases, following earlier rulings on motions by Mylan and Aurobindo. The remaining defendants face their own pending motions.