Great Neck Doctor to Serve 13 Years in Prison for Operating Opioid Pill Mill

By Brendan Krisel

A doctor who operated an illegal pill mill out of a Washington Heights office will serve 13 years in federal prison.

From October 2012 to December 2014, Moshe Mirilashvili, 68, of Great Neck, wrote more than 10,000 unnecessary prescriptions for oxycodone, dispensing around 1 million pills and collecting more than $2 million in cash from his "patients," according to a Department of Justice press release.

Mirilashvili ran his scheme from a doctors office on West 162nd Street, according to the indictment. The crooked doctor charged $200 to $300 cash for appointments that would result in a large prescription of oxycodone, often 90 tablets, DOJ officials said.

Mirilashvili's scheme likely contributed to the illegal sale of opioids on New York City streets, officials said.

The "patients" who would receive drug prescriptions would often be recruited by drug traffickers known as "crew chiefs," who would re-sell the pills on the street. Often times these drug traffickers would pay Mirilashvili directly, officials said.

More than 13 million people abuse prescription oxycodone every year, resulting in 500,000 annual emergency room visits, officials said. Ten other members of Mirilashvili's scheme, including crew chiefs and clinic staff who sold access to Mirilashvili, have pled guilty to their roles in the drug ring, officials said.

"Moshe Mirilashvili was essentially a drug dealer masquerading as a doctor. Through his sham medical practice in Manhattan where patients and dealers would line up, Mirilashvili wrote more than 10,000 medically unnecessary prescriptions totaling close to a million oxycodone pills," said Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara in a statement. "As today’s sentence makes clear, those who abuse their medical licenses to fuel the opioid epidemic that is devastating so many of our communities will be prosecuted and severely punished."

Photo: flickr user Be.Futureproof