List of largest pharmaceutical settlements

The following is a list of the 20 largest settlements reached between the United States Department of Justice and pharmaceutical companies from 1991 to 2012, ordered by the size of the total settlement. The settlement amount includes both the civil (False Claims Act) settlement and criminal fine. Glaxo's $3 billion settlement included the largest civil, False Claims Act settlement on record, and Pfizer’s $2.3 billion settlement including a record-breaking $1.3 billion criminal fine. Legal claims against the pharmaceutical industry have varied widely over the past two decades, including Medicare and Medicaid fraud, off-label promotion, and inadequate manufacturing practices. With respect to off-label promotion, specifically, a federal court recognized off-label promotion as a violation of the False Claims Act for the first time in Franklin v. Parke-Davis, leading to a $430 million settlement.