SEATTLE – A U.S. District Court judge sentenced a former hospital anesthesiologist to five years in prison on Thursday for drug dealing.
Dr. Hieu Tu Le, 40, of Snohomish, Washington, a physician since 2004, wrote oxycodone prescriptions for cash and sold oxycodone for cash from March 2012 to July 2013, federal officials said.
The prescriptions and oxycodone were given to people who had no medical need to receive the drug, according to officials.
Le operated medical clinics in Seattle and Everett, Washington.
“This defendant essentially operated an open-air drug market out of the parking lot of his medical clinic,” said U.S. Attorney Jenny A. Durkan. “As a medical doctor he knew the damage of addiction but sold drugs to feed his greed.”
The case was investigated by the DEA and Health and Human Services.
During the sentencing, U. S. District Judge Thomas S. Zilly noted the “potential public danger of the conduct.”
Le left his job as an anesthesiologist with Valley General Hospital in Monroe, Washington in March 2012.
From March to September 2012, officials said Le operated a medical clinic on Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighborhood providing medical marijuana authorizations.
In September 2012, Le opened a clinic in Everett, Washington called Northwest Green Medical.
Le wrote multiple oxycodone prescriptions for cash to people who did not need the prescriptions for legitimate medical purposes. He would also hand deliver the prescriptions to an Everett pharmacy, pick up the oxycodone pills, and then sell the pills to people, officials said.
Le knew that some of the people to whom he sold the pills were reselling them to others, feeding drug addiction in the community, authorities said.
Sentencing Memo to Court Requested Lengthy Sentence
In their sentencing memo to the court to get a lengthy sentence, prosecutors stated: “According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in 2010 there were 16,651 overdose deaths involving prescription opioids, a tally which outnumbered overdose deaths from all other illicit drugs (including heroin and cocaine) combined.”
“In 2009, for the first year ever, opioid deaths surpassed motor vehicle crashes as a cause of death in the United States. …. As a medical doctor, the defendant ignored the harsh realities of addictive painkillers, suggesting that he lost whatever moral compass he may have had.”
As part of the plea agreement, officials said Le is forfeited various brokerage and bank accounts as proceeds of his drug distribution, and a 2009 Toyota Highlander Hybrid purchased with drug distribution proceeds.