Practicing Medicine Under False Pretenses

Illegal drugs and prescription drugs that are widely sold on the black market for recreational purposes are known as “controlled substances” because they are subject to the tightest legal controls regarding their use in clinical practice. Schedule I controlled substances have no legally accepted medical uses at all and are always illegal. The others require more documentation and oversight in their prescribing and dispensing than most pharmaceutical drugs. Many of the medications in clinical use are not controlled substances listed under federal and state versions of the Controlled Substances Act, but they are also not available for purchase over the counter. Most prescription drugs have little recreational abuse potential, but it is still unsafe to use them without direction by a doctor; lowering your blood sugar or blood pressure is not fun, and you also have little chance of doing it safely and effectively without professional guidance. Despite this, everyone is an expert in the Internet Age, and some people try to hack their health by illegally obtaining prescription drugs to use them in ways that would never get a physician’s approval. If you are facing criminal charges for illegally possessing or dispensing prescription drugs which are not listed on the Controlled Substances Act, contact a West Palm Beach criminal defense lawyer.

Palm Beach County Man Faces Criminal Charges for Dispensing Hormonal Medications From Phony Pharmacy

Broadway Health, a pharmacy in Lantana, attracted the attention of law enforcement after customers notified authorities that patients seemed to go there to get prescription medications that doctors would have been unlikely to prescribe for them. The Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office and the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) investigated, and eventually they sent an undercover Sheriff’s deputy to buy drugs from Broadway Health. The undercover deputy bought the male sex hormone testosterone, the pregnancy hormone human chorionic gonadotropin (HCG), and anastrozole, a drug that suppresses estrogen production and is therefore used to treat breast cancer and other estrogen-dependent forms of cancer. None of these drugs is listed as a controlled substance, but they are also only available by prescription. Testosterone and HCG are both sought out on the black market, though, the former by men attempting to preserve their youth and the latter by women attempting to lose weight.

Based on this, the deputy showed his badge and arrested the person dispensing the drugs, Frank Haberle. Haberle claimed that he was dispensing the drugs under the direction of a physician; he may use this defense in court if he pleads not guilty. He is currently facing criminal charges for practicing medicine without a license; he also has prior convictions related to posing as a healthcare professional. The maximum sentence for this charge is $5,000 and five years in prison.

Contact a West Palm Beach Criminal Defense Lawyer Today

Attorney William Wallshein has more than 41 years of experience, including five years as a prosecutor in Palm Beach County.  Contact William Wallshein P.A. in West Palm Beach, Florida to discuss your case.

Source:

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