ATTORNEY GENERAL RAOUL: JUDGE DENIES MOTION TO DROP KEY CLAIMS IN GENERIC DRUG PRICE-FIXING CASE

ATTORNEY GENERAL RAOUL: JUDGE DENIES MOTION TO DROP KEY CLAIMS IN GENERIC DRUG PRICE-FIXING CASE

December 05, 2025

Chicago - Attorney General Kwame Raoul announced that a court dismissed a motion for summary judgment filed by the drugmakers seeking to toss key elements of an ongoing drug price-fixing case.

Illinois and a coalition of nearly all states and territories filed three antitrust lawsuits against pharmaceutical companies and executives that allege conspiracies to artificially inflate and manipulate prices, reduce competition and unreasonably restrain the trade of generic drugs, accounting for billions of dollars of sales in the United States. The alleged schemes increased prices affecting the health insurance market, taxpayer-funded health care programs like Medicare and Medicaid, and individuals who must pay inflated prices for their prescription drugs.

"Americans are tired of having to choose between paying for everyday necessities like rent or groceries and life-saving prescriptions," Raoul said. "I am pleased with the court's decision, and I will continue to stand with my fellow attorneys general to ensure that pharmaceutical companies and executives are no longer able to continue the illegal and immoral tactics that fuel health care inequity around the country."

Defendants in one of the cases filed a joint motion for summary judgment, asking the U.S. District Court for the District of Connecticut to dismiss core claims related to the overarching conspiracy that connects the drugs and defendants in question, and establishes liability for each of the individual drug conspiracy claims.

In denying the drugmakers' motion, U.S. District Judge Shea Michael P. Shea found that the states "marshaled a substantial bulk of evidence to support [their] allegations," and that "a reasonable juror could infer that sharing information with competitors, providing assurances that a generic drug maker would follow price increases, and refraining from poaching customers were widespread practices in the markets for the drugs at issue."

This is the latest development in Raoul and the coalition's legal challenges. The cases stem from a series of investigations built on evidence from several cooperating witnesses at the core of different conspiracies, a massive document database comprised of over 20 million documents, and a phone records database containing millions of call detail records and contact information for over 600 sales-and-pricing individuals in the generics industry.

The first complaint, filed in 2016, included Heritage and 17 other corporate defendants, two individual defendants, and 15 generic drugs. The second complaint was filed in 2019 against Teva Pharmaceuticals and 19 of the nation's largest generic drug manufacturers. The complaint names 16 individual senior executive defendants. The third complaint, to be tried first, focuses on 80 topical generic drugs that account for billions of dollars of sales in the United States and names 26 corporate defendants and 10 individual defendants.

The multistate coalition has reached a series of settlements with several executives and companies. Seven pharmaceutical executives have entered into settlement agreements, as well as Apotex and Heritage, which paid $39.1 million and $10 million, respectively.

If you purchased a generic prescription drug listed here between May 2009 and December 2019, you may be eligible for compensation. To determine your eligibility, call 1-866-290-0182 (Toll-Free), email [email protected] or visit www.AGGenericDrugs.com.