A pharmacist who owned and operated an independent pharmacy in Madera, California, was sentenced to more than seven years in federal prison for illegally trafficking hundreds of thousands of opiate pills. The Drug Enforcement Administration announced the sentence on November 25, 2024.
According to court records, between December 2014 and November 2018 the pharmacist dispensed more than 450,000 oxycodone and hydrocodone pills based on fraudulent prescriptions that co-conspirators brought to him. He required cash payments from the co-conspirators and increased the price he charged over time.
Court records indicated the pharmacist screened the fraudulent prescriptions, rejecting those purportedly written by certain doctors or written for individuals who were filling prescriptions at other pharmacies, because he believed those prescriptions were more likely to draw scrutiny.
The case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Drug Enforcement Administration and the California Department of Health Care Services under the Justice Department's Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force program. Officials described the operation as dismantled and said those who chose profit over public safety were held accountable.