TY - GEN T1 - Fat chance : diet mania, greed, and the infamous fen-phen swindle A1 - Christman, Rick LA - English PP - Lexington, Kentucky PB - South Limestone, an imprint of the University Press of Kentucky YR - 2021 UL - https://ebooks.jgu.edu.in/Record/ebsco_acadsubs_on1225548511 AB - During the early 1990s, the diet drugs fen-phen and Redux achieved tremendous popularity. The chemical combination was discovered by chance, marketed with hyperbole, and prescribed to millions. But as the drugs' developer, pharmaceutical giant American Home Products, cashed in on the miracle weight-loss pills, medical researchers revealed that the drugs caused heart valve disease. This scandal was, incredibly, only the beginning of an unbelievable saga of greed and graft. In Fat Chance, Rick Christman recounts a story that a judicial tribunal member later described as "a tale worthy of the pen of Charles Dickens." As class action lawsuits against American Home Products began to be filed, four avaricious attorneys saw an irresistible opportunity. Bill Gallion, Shirley Cunningham, Melbourne Mills, and Stan Chesley contrived to a bring a class action suit to trial in Covington, Kentucky, where their hired trial consultant, Mark Modlin, had a manipulative relationship with the presiding judge, Jay Bamberger. Their efforts were rewarded with a $200 million settlement -- a sum that the four lawyers immediately set out to plunder and misappropriate. Ultimately, two of the attorneys received long prison sentences, another was acquitted after claiming to be unaware of the grift due to his alcoholism, and one managed to escape criminal charges; all four were disbarred, and Bamberger was disbarred and disrobed. Recounting a dramatic affair that bears conspicuous similarities to opioid-related class action litigation against the pharmaceutical industry, Christman offers an engaging if occasionally horrifying account of one of America's most prominent product liability cases and the settlement's aftermath OP - 234 CN - RM222.2 .C4844 2021eb SN - 9781949669329 SN - 1949669327 SN - 1949669319 SN - 9781949669312 SN - 9781949669305 KW - Weight loss. KW - Appetite depressants. KW - Fenfluramine. KW - Phentermine. KW - Products liability : Drugs : United States. KW - Weight loss preparations industry : Law and legislation : United States. KW - Weight Loss KW - Appetite Depressants KW - Fenfluramine KW - Phentermine KW - Perte de poids. KW - Anorexigènes. KW - Responsabilité du fait des produits : Médicaments : États-Unis. KW - HISTORY : United States : State & Local : South (AL, AR, FL, GA, KY, LA, MS, NC, SC, TN, VA, WV) KW - Appetite depressants KW - Products liability : Drugs KW - Weight loss KW - Weight loss preparations industry : Law and legislation KW - United States KW - Electronic books. ER -