Lyrica peddling ring

TDT | Manama

A renowned Bahraini doctor who was involved in a vast narcotics peddling case was handed a seven-year jail term yesterday by the First High Criminal Court. The doctor is the prime defendant in the case, which involved six other defendants who were convicted yesterday of drug abuse, possession and peddling, among other charges such as forging official documents.

Two of them were sentenced to six years of imprisonment and fined BD2,000 each, while another defendant received a verdict of three years of imprisonment and deportation. The fifth defendant was sentenced to two years of imprisonment and fined BD1,000. The sixth man was handed a sentence of one year in jail for forging official documents, and the seventh defendant was acquitted.

The details of the case show that the defendants were guilty of dispensing large quantities of addictive prescription pills known as Lyrica, using fake prescriptions issued by the doctor and illegally selling it to addicts for higher prices that are often more than four times their original cost.

The ring was exposed when the Public Prosecution announced earlier this year that the Military Police of the Bahrain Defence Force (BDF), in cooperation with the Anti-Narcotics Department in the Interior Ministry, arrested a military staff member and two civilians as they were illegally selling the pills.

As reported earlier, one of the defendants told interrogators that he was familiar with consuming the medicine, claiming that it was prescribed to him after he was involved in a traffic accident back in 2010. Explaining further, he stated that he had met some individuals who asked him to illegally sell them the medicine prescribed to him for prices ranging between BD10 to BD20.

The suspect confessed that he continued doing so, taking advantage of the prescriptions issued in his name and illegally selling the drugs for a couple of years. He also said that throughout this process of selling Lyrica to addicts, he had met the prime defendant a few months before he was arrested.

He revealed that the doctor prescribed large quantities to him in one go, as he, the doctor, worked in several hospitals and was cooperating with several pharmacies around the Kingdom, some of which he owned, to dispense the medicines to the defendant.

In his statements, the man mentioned that a relationship had developed with the doctor, as the latter requested him to provide him with copies of identity cards so more prescriptions could be issued to sell larger quantities of Lyrica to addicts. He added that he once sold a box of Lyrica packets for BD3,000, using the same method.

Investigations revealed that some of the prescriptions were issued in 2019 to individuals who had left Bahrain in 2018. The defendant also informed interrogators that he would averagely collect 60 packets from certain pharmacies that are advised by the doctor every two days, adding that he would sell one packet for prices ranging between BD50 to BD100, and that sometimes when the demand is high he would collect more than 100 packets at one go.

For his part, the doctor, who is a consultant and had reportedly been practising medicine for over 30 years, denied the charges of peddling drugs or assisting in selling it. He justified his stance saying: “My intention was to only help needy people and patients, especially that I have been practising medicine for more than 30 years.”

Reports provided by the National Health Regulatory Authority (NHRA) showed that the doctor had issued prescriptions of Lyrica and similar drugs from pharmacies that are affiliated with him. The reports showed that around 3,000 packets were collected in only four months.

How they got busted? On January 20 this year, Muharraq Governorate Chief Prosecutor Ahmed Abdullah Al Ramadhan was quoted in a press statement released by the Public Prosecution confirming the arrest of the ring. The Chief Prosecutor said that large quantities of narcotics and amounts of money collected from selling the drugs were found in the arrestees’ possession.

Back then, Al Ramadhan stated that the prosecution launched a probe into the incident, interrogated the arrestees, heard witnesses’ testimonies, and reviewed a report prepared by the technical committee, which inspected the computers in a number of public and private hospitals and analysed data.

The Chief Prosecutor explained further in the statement saying that it was proven that the accused doctor issued fake prescriptions and reports that stated that the individuals mentioned on the prescriptions had undergone the necessary medical examination and are worthy of collecting the narcotics.

Al Ramadhan also confirmed that other suspects who were involved in the case would purchase the narcotics from certain pharmacies, where the pharmacists are also affiliated in their plot, and later sell the pills to drug addicts for higher prices. He added that the prosecution issued arrest warrants against other suspects who are abroad.