Shares of Ab­b­Vie $AB­BV took a hit on Tues­day af­ter­noon af­ter Cal­i­for­nia In­sur­ance Com­mis­sion­er Dave Jones filed suit against the phar­ma gi­ant, al­leg­ing that the com­pa­ny en­gaged in an elab­o­rate and ex­ten­sive kick­back scheme to per­suade physi­cians to pre­scribe Hu­mi­ra — their big block­buster and the most lu­cra­tive drug on the mar­ket to­day.

The suit, which was heav­i­ly redact­ed, in­clud­ed claims that Ab­b­Vie of­fered doc­tors a range of in­cen­tives — in­clud­ing gifts and trips — along with an ex­ten­sive nurs­ing pro­gram that put com­pa­ny paid “am­bas­sadors” in the homes of pa­tients to help guide their care:

These Am­bas­sador save physi­cians time, mon­ey, and re­sources. At no cost and con­sid­er­able gain to the physi­cian’s of­fice, Ab­b­Vie nurs­es pro­vide pa­tient care, phar­ma­cy and in­sur­ance au­tho­riza­tion as­sis­tance, open en­roll­ment re­sources, pa­per­work help, ad­vice on in­sur­ance prod­ucts, and oth­er ser­vices, all of which pro­vide a sub­stan­tial val­ue, so long as the doc­tors pre­scribe Ab­b­Vie’s drug in­stead of se­lect­ing an­oth­er course of treat­ment.

Cit­ing a whis­tle blow­er — for­mer com­pa­ny rep­re­sen­ta­tive Lazaro Suaro, who helped as a train­er in the nurs­ing pro­gram — the com­mis­sion­er claimed that Ab­b­Vie pro­vid­ed a host of ser­vices for the doc­tors at no cost, in­clud­ing soft­ware and pri­or au­tho­riza­tion as­sis­tance, which amount­ed to a kick­back in­volv­ing free pro­fes­sion­al ser­vices.

Ab­b­Vie stock was down more than 2% be­fore the mar­ket closed.

The state went on to cite the $1.3 bil­lion in pay­ments the state’s in­sur­ers had made to cov­er Hu­mi­ra dat­ing back to the be­gin­ning of 2013, de­mand­ing $10,000 for each of near­ly a quar­ter mil­lion claims with to­tal dam­ages rang­ing in the bil­lions of dol­lars.

The state al­so went out of its way to spot­light the law­suit, filed in a state cour­t­house.

Ab­b­Vie made $18.4 bil­lion from Hu­mi­ra sales last year, and with a clear run­way that stretch­es out sev­er­al more years in the US, the com­pa­ny has made it clear that they ex­pect to see that num­ber swell by 2023.

Im­age: Ab­b­Vie fa­cil­i­ty in Cam­bridge, Mass­a­chu­setts AP Im­ages