In the 1980s, Johnson & Johnson needed a reliable supply of opium for a popular product, Tylenol with codeine. So the health care conglomerate... bought a business that grew and processed opium poppies in faraway Tasmania, off the coast of Australia. By 2015, at the height of the nation’s opioid epidemic, Johnson & Johnson was the leading supplier for the raw ingredients in painkillers in the United States...

But on Monday, a judge in Oklahoma singled out Johnson & Johnson, ordering it to pay the state $572 million and ruling that the company should be held responsible for decades of opioid addiction and the thousands of overdose deaths in the state.

The judge cited the company’s overly aggressive marketing tactics: Sales representatives were coached to avoid the “addiction ditch” — the negatives associated with drug use and dependence — when encouraging doctors to prescribe opioids for patients with moderate to severe pain... For Johnson & Johnson, which has said it plans to appeal, the decision represents another blow to its reputation as the trusted brand...