After Receiving Millions in Drug Company Payments, Pain Doctor Settles Federal Kickback Allegations

A dozen years ago, a Santa Monica, California, pain doctor named Gerald M. Sacks emerged as one of the pharmaceutical industry’s top paid speakers — anointed to extol the virtues of a variety of drugs, even though several experts in pain medicine said they’d never heard of him.

His drug company haul had occurred largely under the radar until 2010, when ProPublica started digging into what the firms were paying physicians to deliver talks and consult on their pills. That’s when we consolidated the payments from seven companies, most of which had been forced...