DEA wraps up 4-state prescription-drug crackdown in South

Drug Enforcement Administration Special Agent-in-Charge of the New Orleans Field Division Keith Brown, right, and U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas Christopher Thyer speak Wednesday at a news conference.
Drug Enforcement Administration Special Agent-in-Charge of the New Orleans Field Division Keith Brown, right, and U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas Christopher Thyer speak Wednesday at a news conference.

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Federal authorities released this chart detailing arrests tied to Perry County Food and Drug in Perryville.

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Federal authorities released this chart detailing arrests tied to the KJ Medical Clinic and Bowman Curve Pharmacy in Little Rock.

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Authorities walk out of Bowman Curve pharmacy on Wednesday, May 20, 2015, where Drug Enforcement Administration agents arrested a pharmacist, according to a senior DEA official.

Four doctors, four nurses and five pharmacists in Arkansas are facing charges in a multi-state prescription drug investigation called the largest-ever of its kind conducted by the Drug Enforcement Administration.

U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas Christopher Thyer and DEA New Orleans Division Special Agent in Charge Keith Brown on Wednesday released details on the effort, named Operation Pilluted, which spanned Arkansas, Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi and in total included the arrests of 22 doctors and pharmacists. Some 280 people in all were charged.

"We are not targeting the medical community," Brown said. "We are targeting the drug dealers that are hiding amongst you, that are using the same degrees and training and the same oath that you in the medical community took — to first do no harm — to profit obscenely from addiction."

In Little Rock, seven people, including one doctor, were arrested Wednesday morning at the KJ Medical Clinic at 11215 Hermitage Road and pharmacist Kristen Holland was arrested at Bowman Curve Pharmacy at 400 N. Bowman Road. A ninth suspect was arrested in Faulkner County.

Seven others charged in the KJ investigation were summoned to appear in court and two — identified as Jason Sowers and Kenneth Lowrey — are still being sought.

Thyer described the KJ clinic as a "pill mill" that worked closely in hand with the Bowman pharmacy to fill fraudulent prescriptions for drugs that were ultimately sold to addicts. He said the investigation started last summer after some larger pharmacy chains notified authorities because they had seen "numerous" prescriptions coming from the KJ clinic.

Thyer said investigators conducted undercover operations that revealed prescriptions being handed out there without medical examinations or with "inadequate" ones.

Three doctors from the KJ facility — Dr. Jerry Reifeiss, Dr. Shawn Brooks and Dr. Felicie Wyatt — each face at least one federal drug charge.

A second, corresponding investigation focused on alleged prescription-drug fraud out of the Perry County Food and Drug in Perryville. More than two-dozen people tied to that prescriptions coming out of that store, including pharmacist owners Christopher Watson and his father, Tommy Watson, are facing charges.

Thyer noted the Perry County store was the tenth-highest distributor of hydrocodone and 28th-highest distributor of oxycodone in Arkansas last year.

"Perry County is a wonderful, little idyllic place," he said. "The entire population of the county is approximately 10,000 people. Yet their pharmacy dispensed more hydrocodone and oxycodone than most large chain pharmacies."

Thyer said the operation also included the arrest of Dr. Richard Johns, who was jailed in Lonoke County earlier this week on 187 state charges tied to fraudulent practices. Johns is a Little Rock-based doctor who authorities said they began investigating after an overdose death in Cabot.

Thyer called prescription drug abuse an "epidemic" and a "public health and community problem" that law enforcement alone cannot fix.

Brown urged doctors to "obey [their] oath" to first do no harm. And he cautioned parents to be careful when children are prescribed pain medications, which he said are "one of the most addictive substances on the planet" and a frequent gateway to heroin abuse.

"And you've got to watch that," he said. "You've got to be in control of that because I've seen too many dead people - young people - in so many cities across this country … that started with that prescription and ended dead with a needle in their arm because they overdosed on heroin."

See Thursday's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for full details.

EARLIER

The Drug Enforcement Administration is wrapping up a multistate crackdown on prescription drug abuse with raids at pain clinics, pharmacies and other locations in the South, The Associated Press has learned.

The early-morning raids in Arkansas, Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi are the final stage of an operation launched last summer by the DEA's drug diversion unit, a senior DEA official said, speaking on condition of anonymity to describe details of the ongoing investigation in advance of a public announcement.

Before Wednesday's raids 140 people had been arrested and agents expected to make another 170, the official said. Suspects in the DEA's "Operation Pilluted" include doctors and pharmacists, the official said.

According to the official, 110 people were arrested in Arkansas before Wednesday, and the details of the arrestees will be released at the public announcement.

The crackdown is focused on the illegal sale of painkillers, including the powerful opioids oxycodone and hydrocodone.

Among the facilities targeted Wednesday is KJ Medical Center, a Little Rock pain clinic not far from the DEA's local field office.

The official said investigators found that the clinic is protected by a security guard and another employee is often stationed outside to direct traffic when patients start showing up around 6:45 each morning.

"If you see a pain clinic with an armed guard, that should raise red flags," he said.

Agents arrested six people who work at the clinic Wednesday morning, as well as a pharmacist from the Bowman Curve Pharmacy at 400 N. Bowman Road in Little Rock, the official said.

In Mobile, Ala., agents are targeting two doctors accused of running multiple pain clinics, the official said.

The official said 24 doctors, pharmacies and others have surrendered their DEA registration numbers as part of the ongoing crackdown. A registration number is required to prescribe certain medications. The agency is moving to revoke prescribing permission in at least 24 other cases, the official said.

People arrested in the ongoing crackdown face a variety of state and federal criminal charges, including distribution of a controlled substance and conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance.

Prescription drug abuse and overdoses involving opioids have been a growing concern for the DEA and public health officials. According to the Centers for Disease Control about 44 overdose deaths a day involve prescription opioids.

DEA prescription data show that Arkansas, Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana were among the top 11 states for prescribing hydrocodone in 2014.

Law enforcement has also warned that people who become addicted to prescription painkillers often turn to heroin when it becomes too difficult to get a prescription.

ArkansasOnline reporter Danielle Kloap contributed information to this story.

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