AstraZeneca Indicted for Bribery - The pharmaceutical corporate crime wave continues unabated - What CIA (corporate integrity agreement) ?
AstraZeneca Indicted In Serbia For Alleged Bribery
November 7, 2011
By Samuel Rubenfeld
AstraZeneca PLC said Monday in a securities filing that it was criminally indicted in Serbia for alleged bribery.The indictment, which according to the filing was served in August, accuses local AstraZeneca employees of having “made allegedly improper payments to physicians” at the Institute of Oncology and Radiology of Serbia.
In the filing, the company said it has filed a number of procedural motions to dismiss the charges.
“We intend to vigorously defend the matter and have filed a number of pending preliminary procedural objections that ask the Serbian criminal court to dismiss the indictment,” Tony Jewell, an AstraZeneca spokesman, said in an email. “This case is still in preliminary stages, so we are not in a position, at this time to comment further or to predict the outcome.”
The disclosure was made when AstraZeneca reported third-quarter earnings on Oct. 27; the Financial Times reported it (sub req) at the time. Monday’s filing, the 6-K required of foreign issuers, was a bundle of press releases made by the company during October.
Last year, the director of the Institute—as well as several others, including the head of AstraZeneca’s Belgrade office—were arrested in an alleged bribery scheme that involved favoring some pharmaceutical companies’ products when purchasing cancer-treatment medicine.
The pharmaceutical industry is already staring at an industry-wide probe in the U.S. into alleged foreign bribery. AstraZeneca was one of several companies that disclosed it was being investigated for possible violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which bars companies and individuals from bribing foreign officials to get or keep business.
Johnson & Johnson settled in April, agreeing to pay $70 million to U.S. authorities. In its latest annual report, AstraZeneca said it’s cooperating with U.S. authorities on the probe, and it couldn’t predict the scope, duration or outcome of the investigation.
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How many times have we heard this line of literal bullshit from AstraZeneca's PR department “We intend to vigorously defend the matter and have filed a number of pending preliminary procedural objections that ask the Serbian criminal court to dismiss the indictment,”
Which really means AstraZeneca plans to spend what ever it takes and pull out all the stops to yet again get away with serious crimes that undoubtedly adversely effect the health and well being of countless numbers of consumers. While walking away unscathed, without accepting responsibility or being held accountable for their many detestable crimes....as they say "Just part & the cost of their criminal business as usual profitable operation".
Big pharma are by far and away the biggest corporate gangsters followed by medical device companies, hospitals and doctors.
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