The One Billion Dollar E-Mail Mistake

When the New York Times broke the story last week that Eli Lilly was in confidential settlement talks with the government, drug company executives accused federal officials of leaking the information.

However, it turned out that a lawyer working for the company had mistakenly emailed confidential information on the talks to Times reporter Alex Berenson instead of co-counsel Bradford Berenson.

Negotiations over Eli Lilly’s alleged marketing improprieties for its schizophrenia drug Zyprexa had reached an unprecedented sum of $1 billion, so Eli Lilly was anxious to keep the talks under wraps.