The cops say 74-year-old Dr. Stanley Cohen had been writing prescriptions for painkillers in his wife's name that he would personally pick up from pharmacies for months.
Aside from the large amount of painkillers he or his wife apparently needed, the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office happened to discover that Dr. Cohen -- a Lake Worth dentist -- voluntarily surrendered his medical license in September 2009.
According to a probable-cause affidavit released today by the State Attorney's Office, Cohen applied for renewal of his registration with the Drug Enforcement Administration about five months after he relinquished his dentistry license, in which he said he'd never let go of the license.
In fact, he had given up his license, according to the sheriff's office, which is why several pharmacies across Palm Beach Gardens started reporting painkiller prescriptions signed by Cohen.
A CVS pharmacy in Palm Beach Gardens told authorities it had filled eight prescriptions in the name of Cohen's wife, which were signed by Cohen on prescription blanks from both his Lake Worth and East Brunswick, New Jersey, dentistry offices.
Six of those prescriptions were for painkillers of various types and dosages, while the other two were for antibiotics, according to the report.
After investigators started looking into the situation, Cohen was still submitting prescriptions to the pharmacy and continued to pick them up himself, the report says.
Around the time the cops found that Cohen had picked up hydrocodone pills from around four pharmacies in Palm Beach Gardens, they also found out about the fraudulent DEA application, police say.
In between all of Cohen's pharmacy trips, he tallied a total of 21 charges sorted out by the State Attorney's Office: seven counts of trafficking hydrocodone between four and 14 grams, seven counts of attempting to obtain a controlled substance by fraud, and seven counts of practicing medicine without a license.
All of the charges are felonies, making the maximum possible prison sentence 280 years if Cohen were convicted on all counts.
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