Richard Duane Johns, a Little Rock physician accused of selling fraudulent oxycodone prescriptions for $500 apiece, was taken into federal custody Thursday after he admitted illegally distributing the addictive opiates and then hugged his family goodbye.
The 51-year-old internist whose medical license has been suspended since June 2015 after his arrest in Lonoke County, was facing a March 27 jury trial on seven federal charges. The charges included conspiring to distribute oxycodone without an effective prescription, the use of which caused a Cabot man's death, and six counts of distribution of oxycodone.
The inclusion of the death in the conspiracy charge would have made the crime punishable by up to 20 years in prison had he been convicted.
In a plea agreement announced in court Thursday, prosecutors dropped the original conspiracy and distribution charges in exchange for Johns' guilty plea to a new charge of conspiring to distribute the Schedule II controlled substance without an effective prescription -- without the added element of causing a death.
But because the charge subjects him to a sentence of 10 years or more in prison, the law required that he be taken into custody by U.S. marshals until his sentencing, which is expected to be scheduled in about three months.
Johns appeared in court with his wife, Kelli, and their four children -- a grown daughter and three younger boys. Sitting next to Kelli Johns was attorney Jane Duke of Little Rock, who is looking out for the interests of the family as the government seeks the forfeiture of any proceeds of criminal activity or anything purchased with the proceeds of criminal activity.
Richard Johns agreed to turn over to the government $155,620 in cash that was seized from his home during a search in April 2015, and a 2006 Ford F250 pickup in which he conducted prescription-selling transactions. The parties agreed to litigate any other possible forfeitures at the time of sentencing.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Anne Gardner told Chief U.S. District Judge Brian Miller that Johns distributed at least 39,000 pills through his fraudulent prescriptions. Those pills, sometimes sold under the trade name OxyContin, could be sold on the street for $30 each.
Johns' attorneys, Bud Cummins and Paul James, both of Little Rock, emphasized to the judge that Johns wasn't aware of the transactions that transpired after he wrote the fraudulent prescriptions.
Gardner said she was prepared to prove at trial that David Larue Scroggins, 58, of Cabot, who is one of the 18 people indicted alongside Johns, regularly provided Johns with the names and birthdates of people in whose names Johns would then write the prescriptions, in exchange for cash from Scroggins.
Gardner said Johns would issue the prescriptions without examining the people for whom he wrote them, and in some cases, without even meeting the people.
David Scroggins is set for a change of plea hearing next Friday, as is Christopher David Scroggins, 38, of Cabot, and at least two other defendants. Marissa Scroggins, 31, of Cabot is scheduled for a plea change on March 22. Six people in the case, besides Johns, have pleaded guilty so far. Charges against Charles Lester Mason, 70, of Searcy were dropped.
The investigation that was initiated by the Lonoke County sheriff's office began in November 2014, when Marissa Scroggins' boyfriend, Curtis Norris, died of an overdose at David Scroggins' house near Cabot.
Johns was first charged in Lonoke County Circuit Court with 187 counts of fraudulent practice, but those charges were dropped when the U.S. attorney's office took over the prosecution of the case.
"Dr. Johns, while purporting to be a health-care professional, is nothing more than a common drug dealer," U.S. Attorney Chris Thyer said in a news release after Johns pleaded guilty.
Thyer added, "With opioid abuse continuing to kill at alarming rates, and an opioid epidemic sweeping across the country, the fact that doctors sworn to help people are contributing to the problem is unconscionable. Dr. Johns will soon face the consequences of his illegal actions, and we will continue to aggressively pursue any health care professionals who have similar criminal thoughts in mind."
Thyer said the conspiracy primarily operated in Lonoke, White and Pulaski counties. After the Lonoke County sheriff's office responded to the overdose death outside Cabot, it sought the assistance of federal Drug Enforcement Administration agents, and an investigation was started into the source of the oxycodone that led to the overdose.
The investigation found that 187 fraudulent prescriptions for oxycodone that had been written by Johns were filled since July 2014 in Lonoke County alone, Thyer said. He said that 38 people associated with Johns were charged with violating the Arkansas controlled substances act in Lonoke County Circuit Court. As of Thursday, Thyer said, 17 of those people have pleaded guilty in the state case.
In White County Circuit Court, 15 people associated with Johns were charged with various drug crimes associated with "Dr. Johns' enterprise," all of whom have pleaded guilty, the news release said.
The superseding information to which Johns pleaded guilty accuses him of carrying out the conspiracy between June 2011 and May 2015.
Stephen Azzam, special agent in charge of the DEA, said that prescription-drug abuse "is an epidemic in this country that destroys countless lives," and that the DEA "is fully committed to the pursuit of any individual who abandons their oath as a medical practitioner."
The Johns case is part of a larger national effort led by the DEA dubbed Operation Pilluted. The news release calls it "an aggressive campaign that targeted the largest sources of illegally diverted pharmaceuticals in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama."
Other agencies that have participated in the investigation include the FBI, the Arkansas State Police, the Central Arkansas Drug Task Force, the White County sheriff's office and the DEA's Little Rock tactical diversion squad, which includes officers from the Beebe, Benton, Conway, Little Rock and Pine Bluff police departments, and the Jefferson County sheriff's office.
Metro on 03/03/2017