December 18, 2025
The Fourth Circuit's decision to unravel an early landmark ruling in litigation over the opioid crisis in a suit brought by West Virginia counties against drug distributors tops Law360's list of product liability cases of the past year, as well as a loss for Tesla in a newsworthy trial over the automaker's Autopilot feature. Here's what other cases garnered attorneys' attention in 2025.
October 28, 2025
The Fourth Circuit on Tuesday overturned a key ruling by a West Virginia judge in the first federal bellwether in multidistrict opioid litigation that went in favor of the country's three biggest drug distributors, finding that the oversupply of opioids can create a public nuisance.
August 05, 2025
With federal judges in West Virginia suddenly split over the central legal theory in opioid litigation, major drug distributors are insisting the theory actually doesn't matter, telling the Fourth Circuit it can uphold their triumph in a landmark trial without even touching the hot-button issue.
July 25, 2025
A new ruling in West Virginia opioid crisis litigation is revealing sharp divisions among the Mountain State's federal judges regarding a pivotal legal theory, potentially boosting a Fourth Circuit appeal by beleaguered municipalities aiming to erase a landmark win for drug distributors.
May 12, 2025
The West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals on Monday declined the Fourth Circuit's request to answer whether the state's public nuisance law applies to the distribution of opioids, saying disputed facts in litigation between local governments and drug distribution companies must first be resolved.
March 18, 2024
The Fourth Circuit asked West Virginia's high court Monday to determine whether the state's public nuisance law can be used to target companies that shipped drugs to pharmacies in a community ravaged by addiction, a crucial question in litigation spawned by the opioid crisis.
January 25, 2024
A Fourth Circuit panel asked repeatedly Thursday why no one had sought help from West Virginia's high court in a bellwether legal clash over whether anti-nuisance laws can be used to target the drug companies that supplied pharmacies amid the opioid crisis.
May 02, 2023
A West Virginia city and county have told the Fourth Circuit that distributors of addictive painkillers misinterpreted state nuisance law and the federal Controlled Substances Act when seeking to uphold a lower court's dismissal of the local governments' multibillion-dollar opioid lawsuit.
April 19, 2023
Drug distributors AmerisourceBergen, Cardinal Health and McKesson on Wednesday urged the Fourth Circuit not to overturn a verdict in a West Virginia opioid case, saying that the volume of opioids they were shipping increased because doctors' standards of care for pain treatment changed.
April 18, 2023
A West Virginia county has asked the Fourth Circuit to overturn the rejection of multibillion-dollar opioid litigation that it says let distributors off the hook for excessive painkiller shipments, saying a trial judge wrongly applied the state's public nuisance law.