Purdue Creditors Zero In on Sackler Messages From a Decade Ago

Bankruptcy creditors are pointing to a trove of decade-old documents as they probe whether members of the billionaire Sackler family improperly took funds out of Purdue Pharma LP, the maker of OxyContin, to keep the assets away from victims of the U.S. opioid epidemic.

Creditors including U.S. states, cities and counties cite recently unsealed memos and emails involving the Sacklers, whose company has twice pleaded guilty to illegally marketing OxyContin painkillers. Creditors say the documents are among “powerful circumstantial evidence” that the Sacklers were worried as early as 2007 about being sued personally and discussed ways to protect their ...