COMPANIES MAY BE LIABLE FOR DRUGS USED IN RAPES

Drug manufacturers whose products are used by offenders to help them commit
rape could be held legally responsible for the crimes, according to a
Melbourne lawyer.

Eugene Arocca was commenting on reports of increasing drug-assisted
date-rape in and around Melbourne clubs and entertainment venues.

Mr Arocca, a senior partner with the Melbourne law firm Maurice Blackburn
Cashman, said American law makers were considering holding drug companies
responsible for damage where alleged offenders used their products to spike
victims' drinks with sedatives or sleeping tablets - in the same way
cigarette manufacturers were now liable.

"The law would not place an obligation upon a third party to foresee the
conduct of a criminal action - in other words, you cannot necessarily say
to a drug company 'a criminal act is going to occur as a result of your
drug'," Mr Arocca, a member of the American Trial Lawyers' Association, said.

"However, what the law does do is often look to prior fact evidence - and
if there is enough of an occurrence, then they will rely upon that as a
basis for (the claim that) the drug company (is) not doing enough."

However, the managing director of Roche Australia, the drug company that
produces several drugs that have allegedly been used in date-rapes,
described the whole idea as "bloody ridiculous".

"If you run somebody over in a BMW, should BMW be sued?" Fred Nadjarian
said. "America's a nut-case country - if you shoot someone, they believe
the gun manufacturer is at fault, not the person who pulled the trigger.

"If you make a kitchen knife and it's used to stab someone, what are you
going to do - sue Sheffield? It's just ridiculous."

Mr Arocca compared the drug companies' position with that of tobacco
companies and cigarettes. "Fifty years ago they didn't put warnings on the
product, they're now coming out with all sorts of warnings and restrictions.

"What the drug companies are leaving themselves open to ... when they know
that a particular drug is being used as a date-rape drug, they're not
taking enough precautions to warn doctors about the prescription of the
drug ... and therefore they can be seen to be accepting responsibility for
the product rather than for the process," he said.

"It's a bit like guns also. (In the United States) they've been able to
successfully prosecute some gun manufacturers for not having proper safety
locks on, even though it (the gun) has been used by a mass murderer in the
course of killing 10 people in a fast food store."

Mr Arocca said new statistics showing at least 1100 victims of
drug-assisted rape in Britain in the past 12 months would translate into
4000 in the US. And with those numbers - particularly if one specific drug
was showing up as the offenders' drug of choice - he would be confident
that litigation had either been considered or was already being issued
against the manufacturers.