XPost: alabama.general, alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, sac.politics
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Former Huntsville physician Shelinder Aggarwal, who was previously
described as a “pill mill doctor” by federal investigators, was one of the 1,499 people to have their sentence reduced last week in the largest
single-day act of clemency in modern history carried out by President Joe Biden.
In 2017, Aggarwal was sentenced to 15 years in federal prison for
illegally prescribing controlled substances and conducting health care
fraud involving $9.5 million in unneeded and unused urine tests, as AL.com previously reported.
“This defendant directly contributed to the opioid epidemic that is
plaguing our nation,” said 2017 FBI Special Agent in Charge Roger C.
Stanton.
“He also cost taxpayers millions of dollars by fraudulently claiming
government reimbursement for thousands of lab tests that he never used to
treat patients. I applaud the work of my agents and our partners to shut
down Aggarwal’s pill mill and hold him accountable for his actions.”
Aggarwal was a pain management doctor who operated Chronic Pain Care
Services on Turner Street Southwest.
In 2012, about 80 to 145 patients a day visited Aggarwal’s clinic,
according to previous investigations.
Initial patient visits typically lasted five minutes or less, and follow-
ups two minutes or less.
Aggarwal did not obtain prior medical records for his patients, did not
treat patients with anything other than controlled substances, often asked patients what medications they wanted and filled their requests,
prescribed controlled substances to patients who he knew were using
illegal drugs, and did not take appropriate measures to ensure that
patients did not divert or abuse controlled substances.
Aggarwal’s 2017 plea agreement summarized an interaction with a patient,
which was captured on video.
In it, Aggarwal notes that the DEA viewed him as the “biggest pill-pusher
in North Alabama” and that many of his patients were “dropping like flies;
they are all dying.”
Between January 2011 and March 2013, urine drug tests accounted for about
80 percent of paid claims Aggarwal submitted to Medicare and Blue Cross,
for a total reimbursement of $9.5 million.
According to his plea agreement, “Aggarwal’s primary motivation for
testing patients’ urine specimens, and submitting those claims for
payment, was financial gain.”
In 2012, Alabama pharmacies filled about 110,013 of Aggarwal’s
prescriptions for controlled substances, according to the Prescription
Drug Monitoring Program (PDMP) for Alabama,
That would equal about 423 prescriptions per day, if he worked five days a week, and resulted in about 12.3 million pills.
The PDMP rated Aggarwal as the highest prescriber of controlled substances filled in Alabama in 2012, with the next highest prescriber writing a
third as many prescriptions.
“Dr. Aggarwal used his medical license to generate tremendous profits by putting hundreds of thousands of pills on the street illegally,” said
former Acting U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Alabama Robert
Posey.
Aggarwal surrendered his Alabama medical license in 2013, along with his Alabama and federal Drug Enforcement Administration certificates to
prescribe controlled substances, after the Alabama Board of Medical
Examiners initiated an investigation.
Records reviewed by FOX54, which confirmed that the Aggarwal listed on the clemency list was former doctor, show he is at a halfway house in
Montgomery and is set to be released on Dec. 22.
Representatives for the Department of Justice did not respond to requests
for verification from AL.com.
https://www.al.com/news/2024/12/biden-grants-clemency-to-former-doctor- called-the-biggest-pill-pusher-in-north-alabama.html
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