United States Drug Enforcement Administration

PHOENIX - The DEA’s Phoenix Field Division has finished calculating the amount of drugs collected from those agencies who participated in the April 28th National Prescription Drug Take Back Day. Arizonans turned out in massive numbers and disposed of 12,025.43 pounds, over six tons, of prescription drugs. The total for...

WASHINGTON - The Drug Enforcement Administration today announced the issuance of an Immediate Suspension Order served on Morris and Dickson Company, a wholesale pharmaceutical distributor, located in Shreveport, Louisiana. Morris and Dickson Company has been the subject of a DEA investigation that alleges that this distribution center failed to properly...

NEW ORLEANS - An indictment was unsealed today against Dr. Wayne Jerome Celestine, age 57, a physician who practices in Gretna, Louisiana and resides in the New Orleans area, announced Drug Enforcement (DEA) Special Agent in Charge Stephen G. Azzam and U.S. Attorney Duane A. Evans. On Monday, April 30...

PHOENIX - DEA announced the 15th National Prescription Drug Take-Back will take place April 28th from 10 am-2 pm local time. Sites will be set up throughout communities nationwide so local residents can anonymously return their unwanted, unneeded, or expired prescription drugs for safe disposal. (DEA cannot accept liquids, needles...

NEW ORLEANS, La. - After collecting more than 9 million (4,500 tons) of expired, unused and unwanted prescription medications at 14 previous events over the past 8 years, the Drug Enforcement Administration and its national, tribal, and community partners will hold the 15th National Prescription Drug Take-Back Day across the...

PHOENIX - The DEA is alerting all law enforcement, first responders and citizens to the confirmed overdose fatality attributed to the very potent and highly dangerous drug, carfentanil. A review of overdose investigation records provided to DEA’s Heroin Enforcement Action (HEAT) revealed the incident occurred in late 2017. Carfentanil is...

TUCSON, Ariz. - The DEA announced today, along with the Arizona Attorney General’s Office, the grand jury indictment of Dr. David Alan Ruben, a medical doctor and board certified psychiatrist. Dr. Ruben was indicted on a total of 26 felony charges, including Fraudulent Schemes and Artifices and Administration of Narcotic...

WASHINGTON - A New Orleans, Louisiana-area woman pleaded guilty today for her participation in a scheme to obtain oxycodone through fraud by creating fictitious prescriptions and to possess with intent to distribute oxycodone on the black market. Acting Assistant Attorney General John P. Cronan of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division...

PHOENIX - The DEA announces the conviction of Thomas Mario Costanzo, a.k.a. Morpheus Titania, of Mesa, Arizona, by a federal jury on March 28, 2018, on five counts of money laundering in Phoenix. This long term investigation resulted in one of the first convictions of a money launderer in Arizona...

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. - DEA and their law enforcement partners arrested 10 defendants who, along with two other defendants, were charged in a 26-count indictment returned by a federal grand jury on March 6, 2018, and unsealed today, announced DEA Assistant Special Agent in Charge Justin C. King and Cody...