Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison today announced he has filed an amended complaint against Purdue Pharma to add eight individuals from the Sackler family. Ellison said, “the Sackler defendants personally control Purdue, each one sat on the board, several are officers, personally involved in designing, implementing Purdue’s deceptive sales and marketing strategy and practices.” Ellison says the family “profited from misrepresentations about the risks and the benefits of long-term use of opioids, even though they knew it was false and misleading. We allege that they knew at least in 1999 that prescription opioids lead to addiction.” Ellison says between 2006 and 2017 Purdue Pharma sales reps visited Minnesota prescribers more than 110,000 times. The State of Minnesota originally filed a lawsuit in state court against Purdue Pharma in July of 2018, accusing the company of deceptive sales and marketing and false statements in advertising. Here’s audio of Ellison’s announcement: