Pharmacist charged with defrauding authorities
By: Freeman Klopott
Examiner Staff Writer
June 24, 2009
A Maryland pharmacist has been charged with Medicare and Medicaid fraud nearly a year after authorities found expired and counterfeit drugs being sold in her two pharmacies, court documents show.
Pamela Arrey is also suspected of sending more than $1 million to offshore accounts, documents said.
According to an indictment recently filed in Maryland’s federal court, Arrey charged about $350,000 to the federal insurance programs for drugs she never dispensed. In some cases, Arrey allegedly billed the insurance programs for physician-authorized refills that the patient never requested, the indictment said.
“We are going to fight these latest charges vigorously,” her attorney Joseph Kum told The Examiner. “I don’t understand how they’ll be able to prove it was her who put the charges through.”
In July 2008, a special agent with the Food and Drug Administration and Maryland’s deputy chief of drug control, Chandra Mouli, found nearly 1,700 pounds of suspected counterfeit drugs in Arrey’s Medicine Shoppe franchise on Liberty Road in Baltimore, court documents said. Among the pharmaceuticals, valued at $749,000, were medications to help epilepsy patients control seizures.
Mislabeled, expired and suspected counterfeit drugs, including those designed to help fight breast cancer, were also found at Arrey’s second Baltimore Medicine Shoppe franchise on Reisterstown Road, documents said.
“The health and safety of Arrey’s pharmacy customers has been put in danger as Arrey, through her pharmacies, dispensed misbranded and expired drugs,” FDA Special Agent Matthew Rosenberg wrote in a sworn statement.
Kum said the large quantities of what Rosenberg described as suspected counterfeit drugs found in the Liberty Road store were destined for shipment to Africa.
“They were not going to be sold to U.S. consumers,” Kum said.
According to Rosenberg’s statement, Arrey makes routine trips to Cameroon, where she owns a pharmacy and clothing store.
When Arrey was originally charged with mislabeling and selling counterfeit pharmaceuticals in July, the state shut down her stores, Kum said. At that point, Medicine Shoppes Inc. invoked her franchise agreement and tried to take the stores away from her. Arrey sued and the case is pending, Kum said. In the meantime, he said, Arrey has sold both Baltimore stores.
Arrey is scheduled to be arraigned Friday in Baltimore’s federal court.
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