DOVER, Del.- The Dover City Council on Monday night voted to retain attorneys to sue pharmaceutical companies over the opioid epidemic, adding the city to a number of other municipalities across the country taking similar legal actions.
The council voted in an executive session meeting to retain Marc J. Bern and Partners, and all other required associates, to file a lawsuit against a list of recommended pharmaceutical companies "that mass manufacture and distribute opioids," which the council believes to be a root of the opioid addiction epidemic.
Dover's action follows a lawsuit filed by Delaware Attorney General Matt Denn against some of the nation’s largest manufacturers, distributors, and retailers of prescription opioid drugs, alleging that their failures to meet their legal obligations have fueled an opioid addiction epidemic that is devastating individuals, families, and communities across the First State.
The state lawsuit seeks to hold them financially responsible for the harm they have caused to the state and its citizens and to require them to change their conduct to help end the epidemic, according to the lawsuit.
Last week, New Castle County also announced it was exploring similar legal actions.
Terms of Dover's planned lawsuit and the companies it plans to sue were not immediately available Monday night. Councilman Tanner Polce said it's believed Dover would be the first municipality in Delaware to file such a lawsuit.
