A court in Paris on Monday found pharmaceutical firm Servier guilty in a case involving its diabetes and weight loss medication Mediator, reports Deutsche Welle.
The case against the drugmaker involved thousands of plaintiffs and is one of the biggest health scandals to erupt in the country.
Servier was found guilty of "aggravated fraud" and "involuntary manslaughter" over the pill, which is blamed for hundreds of deaths.
The company's former deputy boss, Jean-Philippe Seta, was handed a suspended prison sentence of four years.
Judges fined the company €2.7 million ($3.2 over the scandal), while France's medicines agency ANSM was also handed a fine of €303,000.
The massive trial involved 6,500 plaintiffs, who alleged that Servier permitted the drug to be prescribed as a weight loss medication, despite the risks. The company was accused of deliberately ignoring warnings and covering up the pill's effects on patients.
Regulator ANSM was also accused of colluding in the cover-up.
The trial opened in September 2019 and ran until July 2020 — spread across five rooms in the Paris courthouse, with nearly 400 lawyers taking part.