A doctor, running a pill mill, caught trading prescriptions for cash leaves a trail of bodies behind.
A respected anesthesiologist ran a pill mill disguised as a pain-management clinic on the weekends. Each Saturday, Dr. Stan Lisaw more than seventy patients a day, writing prescriptions for Oxycontin, Xanax, and other opioids.
Today’s episode features former New York City Assistant District Attorney and author of Bad Medicine Charlotte Bismuth.
Dr. Li’s side hustle was located in Flushing, Queens, just outside of New York City. Flushing Queens is one of the largest and fastest-growing Chinese population outside Asia.
So why would a respectable doctor need a side-gig? Charlotte Bismuth wanted to find out. So the first thing she did was to figure out where Dr. Li was spending his free time. His side-hustle was located in the basement of a residential building. When Charlotte walked down the concrete stairs, she saw a sign that read “pain clinic” in English and standard Chinese.
Charging a doctor with homicide
Many people died under Dr. Stan Li’s care or lack of. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, overdoses involving opioids killed nearly 47,000 people in 2018, and 32% of those deaths involved prescription opioids.
The New York City’s DA’s office wanted to slap Dr. Li with the highest possible crime — homicide. Charlotte and her team wanted the name of every person who died of an overdose under Dr. Li’s care. First, they had to comb through a list of people who died in NYC of an overdose.
Unfortunately, there wasn’t a shortage of body bags. But connecting Dr. Stan Li to deaths resulting from an overdose wasn’t going to be easy.
The trick was picking the right victims. The DA’s office burden is proving that Dr. Stan Li is responsible for these deaths without the shadow of a doubt. That’s hard to prove.
How do you prosecute a doctor for homicide involving prescription drugs when it’s rarely been done before?
Dr. Stan Li goes to prison
It took almost a year for the DA’s office to build its case before ever confronting Dr. Li. Charlotte Bismuth and her team interviewed seventy-two witnesses, Dr. Li’s employees, patients, and families of his victims.
11 months after getting that sticky note with the detective’s tip, authorities served Dr. Li with a search warrant. Authorities busted in and yelled, “Police! Everybody stay where you are. Nobody move.” They moved in toward the closed door where Dr. Li was seeing a patient. After reading him his rights, and quietly walked him out of the building in handcuffs.
A jury convicted Dr. Stan Li on 195 counts, including two counts of manslaughter for two of his patients’ deaths. He was sentenced to 10 to 20 years in state prison.
Dr. Li turned 60 years old when he went to prison. He’s served 6 years in prison and probably will spend the rest of his life behind bars. Well, that was the plan. But shortly after my interview with Charlotte Bismuth, I learned some surprising news. It seems Covid-19 had other plans for Dr. Li. Dr. Stan Li died in prison on April 26th, 2020.
Violating the Hippocratic Oath
The Hippocratic Oath is one of the oldest covenants in medicine. It establishes medical ethics that still guide doctors today. It was written by the ancient Greeks between the fifth and third centuries BC. Today, these students are reading a modern version of the oath. But one of the most important principles is the line “First do no harm.” Although that exact phrase is not actually in the Hippocratic Oath, it pretty much sums it up.
When the ceremony ends, the new doctors are reminded that they’re now ready to heal the world. Their new mission is to reduce pain and suffering for their patients. While most of these new doctors leave this ceremony and abide by the Hippocratic oath, some do not.
The oath is technically not a binding contract. It’s just an understanding between doctors. However, if a doctor violates the promise, they could lose their license and never practice medicine again. So, one could argue that once you break the oath, you’re no longer a doctor. You’re just a criminal wearing a white coat. Today we’re going to talk about crooked doctors practicing bad medicine. Not incompetent doctors who slip up here and there. No. These doctors are criminals who are accused of the most severe crime of them- all homicide.
The opioid epidemic is the decay of America
What we’re seeing today are doctors overprescribing pain medication to people who don’t need it. Oxycontin, Percocet, Vicodin… We’re witnessing the decay of America. People who you would never picture as an addict are slaves to their pain medication. Our cousins, sister, brother, mothers… Someone you know has battled with addiction to opioids. From 1999 to 2016, half-million Americans have died of opioids overdoses. And some of the people responsible are the same ones we in society who we are conditioned to trust the most… doctors.
The first episode I ever recorded for PRETEND was about the opioid crisis. It was the series that inspired this podcast. I knew my cousin was a criminal, I just didn’t know what got him in trouble. A pill mill is a drug house masquerading as a legit pain management clinic. My cousin hired a real doctor to write prescriptions for opioids to patients looking for a fix.
That series is called “Birth of a con man.”
My cousin who owned the pain clinic went to federal prison and served time. But the doctor writing the scripts never did time. I can only imagine how many people overdosed and died under their care.
People are dying… so why aren’t more doctors going to jail? And why aren’t they being charged with homicide? I mean, let’s face it, if you purposely hand over a lethal dose of painkillers to an addict, isn’t that the same as handing someone a loaded gun?
Links
Here’s a link to the Birth of a Con Man series.
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