Purdue bankruptcy settlement leaves families angry, conflicted

Among the families who lost children and other loved ones in the nation’s opioid crisis, many had held out hope of someday facing OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma and its owners in a courtroom.

That prospect all but vanished Wednesday after a bankruptcy judge conditionally approved a settlement worth an estimated $10 billion. It was a deal that left many of those families feeling they didn’t get what they really wanted.

There was no apology from members of the Sackler family who own Purdue Pharma, they weren’t forced to give up all of their vast fortune, and there was no chance to confront them face-to-face about the lives lost to opioids.