The Lawyers Are Facing the Hardest Problems in AIT Laboratories Litigation
AIT Laboratories, a premier developer and manufacturer of pharmaceuticals and other health care products, has recently settled a lawsuit brought against the company. The case was filed by a group of whistle-blowers who alleged that AIT had falsified data in the development of its cancer treatment drugs. According to media reports, AIT had settled the lawsuit at a value of around $456 million. The company later issued a statement denying all the allegations.
Ait Laboratories Lawsuit
AIT had set up its own internal forensic team to look into any claims of malpractice relating to the efficacy of its drugs. Subpoenas were served on the company’s offices in New York, its warehouse in North Carolina, and its facilities in India, China, and Italy. When the investigators reached the plant premises, they found that none of the folders or records were missing. Instead, all relevant documentation was missing or had been tampered with. The whole episode has been widely publicized and has caused embarrassment for AIT.
The attorneys general of many states have also received complaints about AIT and are investigating the matter.
According to statements released by the company, it is confident that the allegations leveled against it are completely false. It says it has now put in place a system of internal auditing and control, controls, and supervision which has successfully controlled fraud within its data bases since it started selling its drugs in the United States in 1996.
However, this does not answer the question as to whether or not AIT was actually guilty of using non-reputable data bases in its marketing campaigns.
There is no doubt that the databases it accumulated contain the most valuable medical data available. However, in clinical trials, data is only used as a basis for drug approval or rejection, and not for clinical decision support or for deciding whether a new drug should even be approved.
Biopsies taken from cancer patients prove to be very useful for drug development. Unfortunately, they cannot be used by generic companies to do the same job. However, all this does show is that the data bases in AIT’s database contained very poor and unverified information. This does not necessarily mean that the company has been guilty of stealing data or engaged in fraudulent activities. It only means that the data bases were not adequately maintained.
One reason why it may be hard for this company to win its lawsuit is that it is not an obvious case.
If it had used up its data bases with false and worthless information, there is a good chance that the company would have been found out. On the other hand, generic companies may not be as careful when it comes to maintaining their data bases. Either way, it is important that a lawsuit of this nature is successful. Lawsuits of this type are usually very complicated, demanding large settlements. It is also not uncommon for them to involve legal experts who help the attorneys interpret the records.
AIT has a long history in the testing community.
In fact, AIT’s reputation has been so tarnished by the recent scandal that many schools have stopped using it. Only recently has a new generation of testing labs emerged, replacing aged data bases with state-of-the-art equipment and software. With this new equipment, schools can once again resume using AIT’s testing services. Given the uncertainties of the situation, courts usually defer to these established data bases in case of any future legal actions.
In the end, courts take whatever evidence they can find to determine if an entity is guilty of fraud or unethical practices. There is no way to get around the fact that in cases like AIT’s, there are too many uncertainties for a court to take one step at a time. However, even with the tremendous amount of work involved in such lawsuits, lawyers often find themselves limited in the time available to meet with their clients. In cases like this, it becomes essential for attorneys to bring in outside help, like a forensic data recovery company.
