Former GSK attorney was charged with obstructing a proceeding, falsifying and hiding documents and providing false statements to the government.
The case against Lauren Stevens, the former vice president and associate general counsel of GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), has been dismissed without prejudice, according to news sources.
Last week, Stevens asked US District Judge Roger Titus to dismiss the case at a hearing in Greenbelt, Maryland, that was ruled in her favor.
Stevens, the British pharmaceutical company’s former associate general counsel, was accused last year of providing false statements to the Food and Drug Administration through a series of letters in 2003 denying that the company has been promoting a drug for unapproved uses, the DoJ says. Previously, Stevens claimed the company did not have promotional slides, which the FDA sought during its probe. Under US law, drug companies are not allowed to promote a drug for a use not approved by the FDA.
According to Dick Cassin, lawyer and owner of the FCPA Blog, the judge ruled that Stevens was entitled to use the defense of advice of the counsel, and that the DoJ’s explanation of that defense to the grand jury was not accurate.
The government argued that the false statements are considered a general intent crime and that a ‘good faith reliance on advice of counsel is only a defense to specific intent crimes,’ writes Ellen Podgor, a crime research professor, on the White Collar Crime Prof Blog.
