Jury Acquits 8 Drug Company Employees

Jurors acquitted eight current and former employees of TAP Pharmaceutical Products Inc. of charges that they offered doctors improper fees, dinners, golf trips and other kickbacks to get them to prescribe certain drugs.

The case against TAP had been closely watched by the drug industry and the medical profession, which have been criticized for giving and receiving freebies. Critics say the practice drives up the already high costs of prescription drugs and erodes public confidence.

Prosecutors argued that the TAP employees lavished golf and ski trips, free dinners and other incentives on doctors, along with free drug samples, in exchange for the physicians’ agreement to prescribe TAP’s prostate cancer drug Lupron and heartburn medicine Prevacid.

A lawyer for one defendant said jurors determined those were legitimate practices.