Yale donor linked to opioid crisis
▻https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2017/11/13/yale-donor-linked-to-opioid-crisis
By 2008, when Raymond and Beverly Sackler endowed Yale with funds for an Institute for Biological, Physical and Engineering Sciences, Purdue Pharma’s misrepresentation of the drug was commonly known — the company had already settled multiple suits.
“These are gifts that different family members made as individual family gifts. These were not gifts from the company — these were individual family gifts, so in that sense, these individuals have wealth that they gave to us, so it’s no more complicated than that when they made these gifts a number of years ago,” said Vice President for Development Joan O’Neill. “We have no reason that we wouldn’t have been excited by the generosity that they provided to Yale and that they’ve provided to institutions around the world.”
In 2009, Richard and Jonathan Sackler endowed the Richard Sackler and Jonathan Sackler Professorship, to be held by the Yale Cancer Center director, with a $3 million gift. Mark Lemmon, the co-director of the Yale Cancer Biology Institute at Yale’s West Campus, currently holds the David A. Sackler Professorship of Pharmacology. According to Dean of the School of Medicine Robert Alpern, the Sacklers have given many gifts over the years to research and lectureship at Yale.
As of July 2014, Richard S. Sackler, former co-chairman and president of Purdue Pharma, was a member of the School of Medicine dean’s council and the Yale Cancer Center director’s advisory board. That year, Alpern called Sackler a “steadfast friend of the medical school.”
In March 2014, Sackler and his children established the Richard Sackler Family Endowment in Medicine, funded by a gift of stock donated by Sackler in 2009, to support three professorships. Raymond and Beverly Sackler have given to Yale to support archaeological excavation work and the establishment of the Raymond and Beverly Sackler Visiting Professor/Lecturer at the School of Medicine.
Asked whether Yale considered the source of the Sackler family’s wealth a factor in deciding whether to accept their donations and why the University ultimately accepted them, Alpern responded that the Sackler family had been “incredibly generous” to the University as well as other organizations. He added that members of the family have always been professional and never asked for anything in return.