United States Drug Enforcement Administration

Spokane - Esther Rae Tuller, age 40, of Moses Lake, Washington, has pleaded guilty to tampering with morphine medication while working as a registered nurse. Chief United States District Judge Stanley A. Bastian accepted Tuller’s guilty plea and scheduled a sentencing hearing for March 17, 2022, in Spokane. According to...

Baltimore, Md., – U.S. District Judge Deborah L. Boardman has approved a consent decree that permanently enjoins Elizabeth J. Allen, a Baltimore-based physician assistant, from prescribing opioids and other controlled substances, resolving the United States’ civil allegations that Allen violated the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) in illegally prescribing opioids. Under...

Greenbelt, Md., – Edwin Kerry Smith, age 43, of Silver Spring, Maryland, pleaded guilty today to possession with intent to distribute a controlled substance and admitted that heroin he distributed to one victim resulted in the victim’s fatal overdose. The guilty plea was announced by Jarod Forget, Special Agent in...

BROOKLYN, NY – Earlier today, at the federal courthouse in Brooklyn, Joanna De Alba was sentenced by United States District Judge Dora L. Irizarry to 96 months in prison for distributing, and possessing with intent to distribute, illegal drugs over the “dark web.” De Alba distributed an array of illegal...

St. Louis, Mo. - Saint Francis Medical Center of Southeast Missouri has agreed to pay more than $1.6 million to settle a civil suit by the United States, resolving claims under the Controlled Substances Act. The U.S. government alleged that Saint Francis employed a Farmington, Missouri, physician, Brett Dickinson, who...

Baltimore, Md., – U.S. District Judge Richard D. Bennett sentenced William Soyke, age 68, of Hanover, Pennsylvania to 37 months in federal prison, followed by three years of supervised release, for conspiracy to distribute and dispense oxycodone, fentanyl, methadone, and alprazolam outside the scope of professional practice and not for...

The DEA Washington Division, an agency currently working to expand partnerships to offer targeted, full-scope solutions for the drug problems in Maryland, Washington DC, and Virginia, today introduced a new webinar series, “Empowering DMV Healthcare Professionals.” The idea for this unique concept was crystalized during the pandemic, when overdose rates...

ALEXANDRIA, Va., – A Florida man pleaded guilty today to unlawfully distributing thousands of prescription opioid pills in exchange for over half a million dollars through the “dark web.” According to court documents, between 2012 and 2020, Daren James Reid, 35, of Fort Lauderdale, used the dark web to distribute...