FEDERAL JUDGE RULES IN OXYCONTIN LAWSUIT

ABINGDON -- A lawsuit against the makers of the popular and potent
painkiller OxyContin will not go forward as a class action, a federal judge
ruled Wednesday. As he made that ruling, U.S. District Judge James Jones
conceded it could affect the legal rights of hundreds or even thousands of
people who believed the lawsuit was protecting their interests.

"There are persons whose interests are being litigated who are not present
and are not represented by a lawyer," the judge said. "Their fate rides on
that of others who are represented."

The ruling came in response to a request by the attorneys for four area
residents seeking billions of dollars from the drug's maker, Purdue Pharma
of Connecticut, a group of related companies and an imprisoned doctor they
accuse of overprescribing the drug.

The plaintiffs claim they became addicted to the drug after taking it for
legitimate medical reasons.

The four named plaintiffs no longer want to represent all the other people
who may have been harmed by the drug, said their attorney Dawn Stewart.
Instead, they want to go forward as individual plaintiffs, she said.

"Their circumstances have changed. They are unable to proceed (as
class-action representatives)," Stewart told the judge. "One plaintiff has
been incarcerated, and we are having extreme difficulty getting in touch
with her."

Pursuing the class action also was expected to be time-consuming and
expensive, Stewart said.

Lawyers for the drug companies already had asked the judge not to certify
the case as a class action, but he had not ruled on that motion when the
plaintiffs asked to drop their bid for that status.

Instead, the judge ordered Wednesday's hearing to decide how to protect the
rights of other potential class action plaintiffs.

Jones said he was concerned because the case had been the subject of
widespread news coverage.

"There were claims there were as many as 150,000 members of this class,"
Jones said, comparing the lawsuit to litigation against the tobacco industry.

By seeking class-action status, the plaintiffs also may have extended the
statute of limitations, or the length of time that others had to sue the
drug company, the judge said. Ending the class action likely would start
the clock running again, he said.

In Virginia, potential plaintiffs have just two years from the time they
allegedly are harmed to file a claim, he said.

To protect the rights of other potential class members, the judge ordered
the plaintiffs' lawyers to publicize the fact the case was not going
forward as a class action.

Stewart outlined the steps her law firm was ready to take, including
mailing notices to any potential plaintiffs who had contacted the firm or
other lawyers involved in the case.

The firm also will issue a press release and will place an advertisement in
a publication for Virginia lawyers, she said.

"We don't want anyone's rights to be prejudiced," Stewart said.

During the hearing, the judge set the case for trial beginning March 3,
2003. The trial is expected to last two weeks and is to be held in Big
Stone Gap unless the lawyers ask to have it moved to Abingdon.

The lawsuit was filed last summer amid a controversy over OxyContin, a
synthetic form of morphine that was designed to be released over time and
provide 12 hours of pain control.

It often is used for chronic, severe pain like that associated with cancer
or some back injuries.

The drug was linked to more than three dozen deaths in Southwest Virginia
last year, most involving abusers who crush the drug and inject or snort it
to defeat the time-release coating and get a heroin-like high.