A New Jersey doctor was taken into custody on Jan. 20 and accused of conspiring with a drug dealer. Both the doctor and the alleged drug dealer were handed conspiracy and drug distribution charges, and they could each face up to 10 years in state prison if they are convicted.
According to investigators, the 56-year-old doctor from Union County provided his alleged accomplice with prescriptions for over 20,000 oxycodone tablets that were later sold for more than $400,000. The 43-year-old alleged drug dealer provided the doctor with several different names and birthdates of people so that prescriptions could be made out in their names. The accused man would then go to pharmacies with these individuals in order to pick up the drugs. Participants in the alleged scheme were paid in drugs and cash.
The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and the state Division of Criminal Justice were behind the investigation into the two accused men's activities. After he was taken into custody at a New York hospital, the accused doctor was booked into Monmouth County Jail and given the option of $50,000 bail. His specific charges were conspiracy, obtaining a controlled dangerous substance through fraud and distribution of a controlled dangerous substance.
A doctor who is facing drug distribution charges might argue that they were unaware of a criminal scheme that was going on around them. As part of a criminal defense, a doctor may present evidence to establish that they were never paid for any prescriptions that they wrote. A criminal defense attorney may be able to help a doctor in this situation to gather any relevant medical records that are needed to prove that no prescriptions were written without a medical justification.
Source: NJ.com, "N.J. doctor charged with conspiring with alleged drug dealer to dole out painkillers,"Christopher Baxter, Jan. 21, 2015