Legal News

Report: Lawyer?s Email Slip-up Leads to Zyprexa Leak

By Dan Slater

As a summer associate, the Law Blog received a lecture from a senior associate urging extreme caution in our e-mail habits. Now we know why.

Last week we blogged about the news, broken first by the New York Times, that Eli Lilly was in settlement talks with prosecutors over the company’s marketing improprieties of its antipsychotic drug Zyprexa. According to the story, the settlement could end in Lilly’s paying more than $1 billion.

So how’d the NYT get the story? According to Portfolio.com, the source of the leak was a lawyer at Pepper Hamilton, who, believing he or she was sending a packet of confidential documents to co-counsel, Bradford Berenson at Sidley Austin, mistakenly e-mailed the documents to New York Times reporter Alex Berenson.

When Berenson began calling around for comment, reports Portfolio, and seemed to possess remarkably detailed inside infomration about the negotiations, Eli Lilly initially believed that the source of the leak had been the government.

Oof.

When reached for comment, Alex Berenson told Portfolio.com, “I can’t say anything. I just can’t.” A spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney’s office in Philadelphia, which is spearheading the Zyprexa investigation, declined to comment to Portfolio.com, as did a spokeswoman for Eli Lilly.

The Law Blog placed a call to Pepper Hamilton for comment, but have yet to hear back. We’ll let you know if we do.

Law Blog readers, would this be the worst e-mail gaffe by a lawyer you’ve ever heard of?

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on February 05, 2008 (boomark / email).