Cadden Moves to Bar Deposition in TN Cases

By Walter F. Roche Jr.

A former drug company executive facing sentencing on racketeering and mail fraud charges is asking a federal judge to shield him from being deposed under oath in related civil cases.
In a motion filed today in U.S. District Court in Boston, Mass. Cadden's lawyers asked U.S. District Court Judge Rya Zobel to deny a motion filed by Tennessee clinics seeking to depose Cadden and others in pending civil litigation.
Citing Cadden's pending motion for a new trial in the criminal case along with expected appeals, the filing states that "although the criminal trial has concluded, the criminal charges against him are far from resolved."
As the filing by attorney Callan Stein notes, Cadden is scheduled for a sentencing hearing before U.S. District Judge Richard G. Stearns on June 29.
"Mr. Cadden has not yet been sentenced, thus, judgment has not yet even entered on the charges against him," the filing states.
The move to depose Cadden comes in a series of pending suits against Tennessee clinics where some victims of the outbreak were injected with contaminated NECC steroids. The clinics are also seeking to depose officials of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and a former sales executive at Cadden's company who has entered a guilty plea to a related charge.
The Cadden filing also argues that if Cadden's motion for a new trial or acquittal is granted in whole or in part, the result could be a new trial on some of the pending counts.
The former head of the New England Compounding Center was convicted on 57 counts of racketeering, conspiracy and mail fraud in late March.
The jury cleared Cadden on 25 counts of second degree murder.
The filing states that Cadden has yet to exercise his rights to appeal to a higher court. In addition while his trial has ended "the criminal charges arising out of this case are not close to being resolved."
Cadden's lawyers asked that an existing order barring Cadden's deposition in the civil litigation remain in effect.
Cadden was one of 14 indicted following a two year investigation of the 2012 fungal meningitis outbreak.  The outbreak, state and federal regulators concluded, was caused by thousands of vials of contaminated steroids shipped by NECC to health facilities across the country.
Trials for other defendants are set to begin in September.