NECC Defendant Wants Access to Civil Trial Data

By Walter F. Roche Jr.


A former drug company executive who is facing multiple second degree murder charges is seeking approval to use records from a related civil case to prepare his defense before a January trial.
The lawyer for Barry Cadden, former part owner and officer of the defunct New England Compounding Center, filed a five-page request this week in U.S. District Court in Boston, Mass. seeking access to thousands of pages of discovery materials in civil suits against NECC and related companies.
Stating that Cadden previously had access to much of the same material because he was also a defendant in the civil case, the motion states that Cadden now needs access to the files "to defend himself against second degree murder charges."
NECC, a Framingham, Mass. drug compounding firm, has been blamed for a nationwide fungal meningitis outbreak that has killed 77 patients and sickened hundreds of others.
Stating that her client is not seeking access to health information of outbreak victims, Michelle R. Peirce, one of Cadden's lawyers, noted that her client had complied with an existing  protective order covering the discovery materials.
"He seeks to use the materials he already possesses as well as other material added to the repository more recently to defend himself," the motion states.
Federal prosecutors have not yet indicated whether they will oppose Cadden's motion, which will be considered by U.S. District Judge Rya Zobel, who is presiding over hundreds of cases filed by victims of the 2012 outbreak.
Peirce wrote that the discovery material in the civil cases is "critical to his (Cadden's) defense of murder and other charges related to contaminated methylprednisolone acetate at the core" of those civil cases.
Cadden and Glenn Chin, a former top pharmacist at NECC, are scheduled to go on trial on 25 counts of second degree murder along with racketeering and mail fraud charges on Jan. 5, 2017.
Contact: wfrochejr999@gmail.com