Federal authorities investigated a pharmacy in Casper, Wyoming, in connection with the criminal case against a physician who was convicted on 25 felony counts of illegally distributing prescription medication and sentenced in August 2019 to 25 years in prison. The pharmacy and its employees were not named in that criminal prosecution.
According to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Wyoming, an audit of the pharmacy identified 128 instances of concern, including patients filling prescriptions for unusually large quantities of narcotic drugs, patients using multiple pharmacies to fill prescriptions, and third parties filling prescriptions for out-of-state patients. Investigators also reported additional problems with the pharmacy's records.
In January 2020 the pharmacy agreed to pay $1 million to settle the government's allegations of federal drug law violations. The civil agreement keeps the allegations from going to court. It does not require the pharmacy to admit wrongdoing and does not require federal attorneys to retract their allegations, so it is a resolution rather than a finding of liability.
A spokeswoman for the pharmacy chain could not immediately be reached for comment at the time of the report.