By Jon King / jking@whmi.com


Appeals have been filed in the murder case against two men charged in Livingston County for their roles in a deadly 2012 fungal meningitis outbreak.

Attorneys for Barry Cadden and Glenn Chin filed motions last month in the Michigan Court of Appeals to reverse earlier rulings against their clients that they should stand trial on 11 counts of second-degree murder. Cadden was a part-owner and Chin was a supervising pharmacist at the New England Compounding Center. Authorities say lax conditions infected steroids produced there that led to the 2012 outbreak which killed more than 100 people nationwide and sickened nearly a thousand others. Investigators connected the compounding pharmacy to Michigan clinics, including Michigan Pain Specialists in Genoa Township, which had dispensed the NECC contaminated steroids.

Chin’s attorneys claim the murder charges are not warranted as prosecutors with the Michigan Attorney General’s Office failed to identify any particular action on his client’s part that caused the deaths. They state that this is really a case of product liability and that the evidence against Chin doesn’t support a second-degree murder charge. Cadden’s attorney filed a similar motion.

In court Thursday, Livingston County Circuit Court Judge Michael Hatty granted defense motions to stay the proceedings pending a ruling from the appeals court. Both men remain in the Livingston County Jail without bond.