Virginia Pharmacy Owner Gets 18 Months

What Happened

In January 2025, Randy Yost, 72, owner of Randy's Gateway Drug in Cedar Bluff, Virginia, was sentenced to 18 months in prison. He had pleaded guilty in May 2024 to health care fraud, conspiracy to commit health care fraud and distributing oxycodone. Court documents said that between April 2016 and June 2023 the pharmacy dispensed cheaper generic Schedule II drugs such as Oxycontin while billing government programs for brand name versions, and billed for medications not dispensed. The government's adjusted loss was $1,309,515, and Yost was ordered to pay restitution to Medicare, Virginia Medicaid and TriCare.

“pled guilty in May 2024 to one count of healthcare fraud, one count of conspiracy to commit healthcare fraud, and one count of distributing oxycodone”
U.S. Department of Justice / U.S. Attorney's Office press release, Jan 7, 2025

Related Guidance

15 Red Flags of Drug Diversion — Behavioral and transactional indicators of diversion.
Investigation Playbook — How to investigate suspected diversion inside an organization.

Sources

U.S. Department of Justice / U.S. Attorney's Office press release, Jan 7, 2025

Case at a Glance

Setting: Independent pharmacy
Drug: Oxycodone and Schedule II drugs such as Oxycontin
Method: Dispensing cheaper generics while billing for brand name drugs; billing for undispensed and returned medications
Status: Sentenced January 2025 to 18 months in prison after May 2024 guilty plea; restitution ordered

Source: U.S. Department of Justice

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Last reviewed: September 2026 · Educational content, not legal advice.

About the author

DivertGuard is built and maintained by Alex Rodriguez, MHIIM, CPhT (also known as Jesus Rodriguez) — a drug diversion prevention program manager with more than a decade in pharmacy practice, including direct responsibility for a health-system controlled substance diversion prevention program.

Conference presentations

2025 — The Rounding Revolution: A High-Tech Approach to Diversion Prevention (with Emily Spiceland, PharmD)
2024 — No Pill Left Behind: Strategies for Comprehensive Drug Accountability (with Eric Andrews)
2022 — Ready for My Close Up! Implementing, Maintaining, and Expanding Drug Diversion Prevention Cameras (with Jeremy Quinn, Shawn Young, and John Bailey)

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Faculty, ASHP Drug Diversion Certificate
Speaker, Health Care Compliance Association (HCCA)
Published author, Pharmacy Purchasing & Products

Credentials

Doctorate candidate — Doctor of Health Informatics (DHI), Rutgers University, School of Health Professions; research on health data analytics and the prediction of cognitive decline
MHIIM — master's in health informatics, University of Tennessee Health Science Center (2019–2021)
CPhT — Certified Pharmacy Technician, with 10+ years of pharmacy practice across retail, hospice, compounding, home-health, and hospital settings

The assessment items, weighting, and case registry behind this site come from that operational background — building and running a diversion prevention program, not from vendor marketing. Every tool here is free, requires no signup, and is based on published regulatory and professional standards (DEA, Joint Commission, ASHP, CDC).

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Related Resources

Diversion Settlements & Fines

Settlements, civil penalties and criminal fines paid by hospitals and pharmacies in documented drug diversion cases, with the amount, year and primary source for each

Penalty Outcomes in the Case Records

Counts of the outcomes the registry records state: prison, probation, fines, licence actions and restitution, with stated sentence lengths by band and by drug class

Registry Insights: Sentences, Fines, States and Outcomes

Sentence lengths, fines and restitution, cases per 100,000 pharmacists by state, and plea and licence outcomes, each counted from the case records with its n, plus charts of cases by year, state and drug class

Virginia Pharmacy Owner Gets 18 Months in Prison