Pill Mill Doc Gets 30 Years

By George Anastasia
For BigTrial.net

A federal judge sentenced pill mill doctor William J. O'Brien 3d to 30 years in prison today for running a multi-million dollar drug trafficking operation with the Pagans outlaw motorcycle gang and for contributing to the death of a patient by prescribing what authorities said was a "lethal' combination of pain medications.

O'Brien, jailed since his arrest in January 2015, showed little remorse during the two-hour hearing before Judge Nitza Quinones. On the contrary, the 51-year-old doctor, who had represented himself during a six-week trial that ended in June, insisted he was innocent and continued to rant against prosecutors and investigators who he said lied and fabricated evidence to build the case against him.

O'Brien was found guilty of 123 of the 127 counts he faced, including multiple counts of drug trafficking. He was also found guilty of money-laundering and lying in a bankruptcy proceeding.

"I don't show remorse because I did nothing wrong," he said in a statement to the court during  today's proceeding.

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Feds Seek Life Sentence For Pill Mill Doc

By George Anastasia
For BigTrial.net

Calling him a "kingpin" who was motivated by "unbridled and amoral greed," federal prosecutors have asked for a life sentence for pill mill doctor William O'Brien who is to be sentenced tomorrow before U.S. District Court Judge Nitza Quinones.

O'Brien was convicted in June of running a multi-million dollar pill mill operation with members of the Pagans outlaw motorcycle gang. Among other things, he was also charged with sometimes foregoing the fee he would charge for writing a script in exchange for oral sex from female "patients."

"The depth and breadth of his criminality was astounding," Assistant U.S. Attorneys M. Beth Leahy and David Troyer wrote in a 28-page sentencing memo. O'Brien, who had medical offices in Philadelphia, Levittown and Bristol, represented himself during a six-week trial before Quinones that ended with his conviction on 123 of the 127 counts he faced, including causing the death of a patient by prescribing a lethal combination of drugs.

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Amateur Hour As Jury Convicts Pill Doctor

By Ralph Cipriano
for BigTrial.net

It was a fitting end to a bizarre trial that featured a novice judge and a pill-pushing doctor who insisted on representing himself as his own lawyer.

It took the jury an incredible two hours tonight to read a verdict that found the doctor who allegedly ran a pill mill that catered to outlaw bikers and strippers guilty on 123 out of 127 counts.

Why did it take two hours? Because Judge Nitza Quinones, who was confirmed in June 2013 and has had limited experience presiding over federal criminal trials, had the court clerk read every word of every count out loud, including all the relevant titles, codes and statutes, and then ask the jury foreman whether the jury had reached a unanimous verdict on each count of guilty or not guilty.

As a result, the court clerk stated a mind-numbing 121 times that Dr. William J. O'Brien 3d was accused of violating Title 21 of the United States Code, Section 841, by distributing controlled substances while operating "outside the usual course of medical practice," and prescribing controlled substances for "no legitimate medical purpose." Amateur hour continued when the court clerk polled the jury, and read the name of every juror out loud, rather that follow the usual custom and refer to jurors by numbers.

By the end of the reading of the two hour verdict, one juror was slumped over; others were dazed and staring off into space. Court observers were shaking their heads and saying they had never seen anything like it.

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O'Brien Plays Trump Card In Pill Mill Defense

By George Anastasia
for BigTrial.net

Dr. William O'Brien compared himself to Donald Trump today while challenging bankruptcy fraud and money-laundering charges that are part of his ongoing pill mill trial.

O'Brien, who is representing himself, was in the midst of a heated exchange with retired FBI agent Kevin Kane this afternoon when he used a Trump reference to try to put his own financial situation in perspective.

 O'Brien seemed to be contending that while his medical practice was in bankruptcy back in 2012, other companies he controlled were not and earnings from one could potentially offset losses from another.

"Do you know Donald Trump, who is running for president right now?" O'Brien asked, referring to the presumptive Republican Party nominee. "Some of his companies were in bankruptcy and others were not in bankruptcy. Did you know that?"

Kane, who withstood nearly three hours of pointed cross-examination without appearing flustered, brushed the question aside.

"I didn't investigate Donald Trump," he replied.

While Hillary Clinton supporters might wish he had, Kane said his focus during the nearly three-year probe was O'Brien, the 53-year-old doctor who authorities say turned his pain management medical practice into an illegal and highly lucrative drug dispensing operation.

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Doctor Vs. Doctor At Pill Mill Trial

By George Anastasia
For BigTrial.net

It was a second opinion that Dr. William O'Brien 3d didn't want to hear.

Dr. Stephen M. Thomas, a Stanford Medical School trained pain management clinician called as an expert witness by the prosecution in O'Brien's ongoing pill mill trial, systematically ripped apart O'Brien's prescription practice, repeatedly telling the jury that his analysis indicated the drugs O'Brien prescribed were not "medically legitimate."

At one point during his day-long stint on the witness stand, Thomas referred to what O'Brien did in his office as "drug dealing."  At other times, he read from the charts of O'Brien's "patients" and then commented on the drugs prescribed.

"This combination will scramble your brain," he said of a combined prescription for oxycodone, methadone, Xanax and Adderall. "And at these doses it's dangerous."

Of another, he said, "Not consistent with legitimate medical diagnosis . . . Not medically necessary."

And of a chart that showed continual increases in the dosages, he added, "This is a pattern for addiction or diversion (selling the pills)." Still later, of a similar situation, he said, "Something else, that is non medical, is driving that."

The clash of the two doctors, which included sharp verbal exchanges and lengthy philosophical ruminations, is expected to continue when the trial resumes Wednesday morning.

The prosecution hopes to use Thomas' testimony to undermine O'Brien's now beleaguered defense. Despite a half dozen witnesses who have testified to the contrary, including O'Brien's own office manager, O'Brien has continued to argue that he was practicing legitimate medicine and had no idea some of his patients were selling the pills he prescribed.

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Another Dancer Details Sex With Pill Doctor

By Ralph Cipriano
for BigTrial.net

She was a former strip club dancer, dark and slender, with waist-length, jet-black hair.

From the witness stand, Kathleen Reeves, 31, told a story about being a young mom who became addicted to prescription painkillers under the care of Dr. William O'Brien 3d.

When the pill doctor ran out of medical reasons to keep treating her, Reeves said, the doctor suggested a business arrangement.

"He said that if I gave him a blow job," she told the jury, "He would continue to prescribe" oxycodone and methadone for her.

"I was so sick, I couldn't function without them," she said about the pills. In the throes of her addiction, "I did things that I would never normally do."

That included providing oral sex to the pill doctor on several occasions.

"I had no choice," she told the jury. " I couldn't get the medication" without a prescription. "I was in too deep."

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Heroin Addict Says She Gave Sex For Script

By George Anastasia
For BigTrial.net

She was six months pregnant with the ugly track marks of her heroin addiction running down both her arms.

She said she wanted methadone to help break her habit.

He said he'd write a script . . . for a blow job.

She agreed.

In some of the grittiest and personally damaging testimony to date, former strip club dancer Deanna Lane told a federal jury yesterday how she exchanged a "sexual favor" for medication in the office of  William O'Brien 3d, the pain management doctor now on trial for conspiracy and drug dealing in what authorities say was a multi-million dollar pill mill operation.

"He locked the door," Lane, 28, said of the office visit late one afternoon back in September 2014.

Lane said previous visits for medications that included oxycodone and Xanax had come with a $200 co-pay. But on this day, O'Brien had a different currency in mind.

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Witness: "Everybody And Their Mother Knows You Did Wrong"

By Logan Beck

For BigTrial.net

Much like a teacher becoming suspicious of school children cheating on their spelling tests, pharmacies began to question the legitimacy of Dr. William O’Brien’s narcotics prescriptions. 

That's the story Bernard Varallo, a cooperating witness for the government, told a jury yesterday during the ongoing "Pill Mill" trial of Dr. O'Brien in federal court.

According to Varallo, a co-conspirator who has already pleaded guilty, patients were unable to “cash the scrips” or “fill the prescriptions” without other prescriptions such as anti-constipation and anti-inflammatory medication to offset the narcotics.

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Murder, Mayhem And Dr. Seuss At Pill Mill Trial

By George Anastasia
For BigTrial.net

They were, according to the government, partners in crime, co-conspirators in a pill mill operation that generated millions of dollars in illegal drug sales.

But today they found themselves on opposite sides of a high stakes legal battle. Michael "Tomato Pie" Thompson was on the witness stand in U.S. District Court and Dr. William O'Brien, acting as his own attorney, was firing questions in a cross-examination that touched on strippers, Pagans, murder, kidnapping and the Dr. Seuss' children's classic "The Cat in the Hat."

Thompson, 50, a South Philadelphia tow truck operator, has been outed during the trial as a police informant who was feeding information to authorities about the Pagans, the outlaw motorcycle gang that made millions from the pill mill operation.

"You want to hang the Pagans but you don't want them to know it's you," O'Brien asked while questioning Thompson about a lengthy interview he gave to authorities shortly after his arrest in the pill mill case.

Thompson acknowledged that the bikers had at one time put a $5,000 contract out on him and that part of the plot was a plan to kidnap his daughter.

"They wanted to kill me and to get to me they were going to use my daughter," Thompson said.

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Jury Hears Fake Legit Description Of Pill Mill Operation

By George Anastasia
For BigTrial.net

It was "fake legit," an associate of the Pagans motorcycle gang told a federal jury today in describing the pain management operation run by Dr. William O'Brien 3d in South Philadelphia, Trevose and Levittown.

"We acted legit, but we were really fake," explained Michael "Tomato Pie" Thompson in what was perhaps the most devastating testimony thus far in the three-week old conspiracy/drug dealing trial of O'Brien who is charged with running a multi-million dollar pill mill in conjunction with members of the outlaw motorcycle club.

Thompson's testimony, which will continue when the trial resumes tomorrow, came after a South Philadelphia waitress and a strip club dancer both told the jury that they were "patients" of O'Brien as part of a scheme to obtain drugs that others would sell on the streets.

All three witnesses said O'Brien was aware of and played a willing role in the scam.

"One hundred percent," the quick talking Thompson said when asked by Assistant U.
S. Attorney M. Beth Leahy if O'Brien knew what was going on. In fact, he said, O'Brien increased his "fee" from $100- or $150-a-visit while running an office at 18th and Jackson to $200-a-visit after moving to another location at Broad and Porter.

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Imbo-Petrone Disappearance May Be Linked To Pagans

By George Anastasia
For BigTrial.net

Did the Pagans have something to do with the disappearance of Danielle Imbo and Richard Petrone Jr., a couple last seen leaving a bar on South Street 11 years ago?

The FBI may think so.

In a bizarre twist to what is already a bizarre trial, the Imbo-Petrone disappearance and suspected murder may have been alluded to during a tape played at the pill mill trial of Dr. William O'Brien 3d. He is charged with conspiring with the Pagans in a multi-million dollar prescription pill scam.

Back in July Patrick Treacy, a member of the outlaw motorcycle gang, was questioned about a "double homicide," although the victims were not identified.

"I didn't murder nobody," Treacy, 48, said in a taped interview played today for the jury at the pill mill trial. The interview lasted about 40 minutes and was being conducted by FBI Agent Vito Roselli who is handling the Imbo-Petrone investigation.

On the audio and video tape, Roselli urges Treacy to "get ahead of all the bullshit that's going to be coming down" and tells him "in order to help yourself, you gotta clean this up."

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The Day Long Duel Between Doctor and Federal Agent

By Shealyn Kilroy 
For BigTrial.net

Special Agent Joshua Gill wasn't taking the attorney role of Dr. William O'Brien 3d seriously.

O'Brien had been asking how the agents could determine how much medication was too much to be prescribed considering the agents weren't doctors. It was a subject that O'Brien returned to all Friday during his day-long cross-examination.

Gill would start his responses with, "How many times do I have to answer this . . ." accompanied by rants that were fast and empty.

"Based on my investigative experience, what you were prescribing was not the proper amount," Gill said, irritated.

"We saw patterns! There was patterns..." Gill said, ranting again.

“Time out!” Judge Nitza Quinones ordered.

Excusing the jury, Judge Quinones had had enough of Gill’s comments made on the stand in his answers that would continuously spark verbal arguments during O’Brien's day-long cross-examination.

“This is my courtroom and I can do what I want,” Judge Quinones said, reminding Gill that it was her decision to allow O’Brien to represent himself.

It was the first time during the two-week trial that Judge Quinones had to chastise a witness.

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Doctor Clashes With Federal Agent Over Blow Job Conspiracy

By George Anastasia
For BigTrial.net

Call it the blow job conspiracy.

And, depending on your point of view, consider it one of the high points or low points of the ongoing pill mill trial of Dr. William O'Brien 3d.

O'Brien, who is representing himself, clashed repeatedly today with Joshua Gill, an investigator with the Department of Health and Human Services, as a federal court jury watched and listened to a cross-examination that was in turns nasty, bizarre, sarcastic and petty. And, at times, effective.

Gill, a veteran investigator with a Clint Eastwood demeanor, will be back on the stand when the trial resumes on Friday. Working for the Office of the Inspector General he is part of the federal task force that built the case against O'Brien.

"Do you guys get a book on the bullshit that you say?" O'Brien asked after nearly two hours of verbal sparring with the bearded agent.

Gill, whose facial expression seldom changed, didn't have to answer that question because an objection by the prosecution was sustained by the judge. But the witness and the doctor immediately got into a heated debate over O'Brien's admitted attempt to trade a higher dosage prescription of Xanax for oral sex.

The "patient," however, was an undercover FBI agent who was secretly taping the office visit in which the doctor suggested "blues (the higher dosage pill) for a blow."  What O'Brien wanted to know from Gill today was where that solicitation fit in the 140-count indictment against him.

It was, the agent said, part of the conspiracy charge at the top of the indictment.

5

Blues For A Blow, Part Deux

By Ralph Cipriano
for BigTrial.net

On Oct. 2, 2014, FBI Special Agent Heather Whelan was operating undercover inside a suspected "pill mill," trying to talk Dr. William O'Brien 3rd into writing her a prescription for extra-strength Xanax, known as "blues."

Dr. O'Brien's response, as captured on an undercover surveillance tape, was to proposition the undercover agent, offering "Blues for a blow."

Today in court, Dr. O'Brien, acting as his own lawyer, got to cross-examine Agent Whelan about his proposition that went nowhere.

From the defense table, O'Brien recalled that the FBI agent had offered him an extra $100 for "blues," but that he wrote out the prescription for her anyway, without taking the money.

"I give you the blue Xanax," O'Brien told Whelan. "I still don't get the blow job?"

"Objection," yelled an indignant Assistant U.S. Attorney M. Beth Leahy. "She's an FBI agent."

"Overruled," said Judge Nitza Quinones, who couldn't stop laughing at the doctor's antics.

"Correct," said Special Agent Whelan, as she stared down the doctor from the witness stand.

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Informant Calls Doctor `Drug Dealer' At Pill Mill Trial

By George Anastasia
For BigTrial.net

She was an FBI informant who posed as a patient with chronic headaches.

He was a doctor who authorities say ran a "pill mill," prescribing oxycodone, Xanax and Percocet for whoever was willing to come up with a $200 "co-pay" for each five- to seven-minute session.

More than a year after their last office visit, Marian Murphy and Dr. William O'Brien 3d squared off in federal court this afternoon as O'Brien's conspiracy and drug dealing trial entered its second week.

It quickly got personal.

Murphy, a waitress with a lengthy criminal record that includes fraud, identity theft and driving under the influence, called O'Brien "the biggest drug dealer in South Philadelphia" and, her voice rising, her face turning red, asked "Do you know how many people are in rehab because of you?"

O'Brien, who is representing himself, shot right back at the witness, asking, "How is South Philly doing right now? Is it cleaned up?"

O'Brien has been held without bail since his arrest in January 2015, a point he has come back to several times during the trial while portraying himself as the victim of overzealous federal prosecutors and FBI agents.

His cross-examination of Murphy gave him the chance to hammer on that theme with questions that not only challenged her veracity and credibility but that also went to the heart of the government's case against him.

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Pill Doctor Prescribes Percocet and Wine for Headaches

Photo Courtesy of DrugAddiction.com

By Shealyn Kilroy For BigTrial.net Dr. William O’Brien 3d’s Headache Curing Cocktail Recipe:

-- Glass(es) of wine
-- Half a capsule of Percocet
--One part muscle-relaxer Flexeril
The jury heard this alcoholic pill potpourri ordered on a video played in court on Friday for undercover informant Marian Murphy. Murphy, acting as a first time patient for the federal government, came to visit Dr. O’Brien for her “headaches.”
“With this, you won’t come back for a few months,” O’Brien said as he walked out of the office.

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Pill Doctor Pecks Away At FBI Agent

By Ralph Cipriano
for BigTrial.net

It could be the dream of any accused felon who's ever been busted by the feds.

Turn the tables on your accusers. Put them on the witness stand under oath. And then make them squirm while you play lawyer and get to ask all the questions you want.

Dr. William O'Brien 3rd was living the dream today. For the second straight day, the accused pill doctor who's representing himself at his criminal trial in federal court had FBI Agent Diana Huffman stuck on the witness stand for more grueling hours of his amateur cross-examination.

For two hours on Tuesday and more than five hours today, O'Brien dragged Huffman through the minutiae of the case, going over one patient file after another. When he wasn't pecking the FBI agent to death, the pill doctor was talking up his own credentials, showing off his medical knowledge, and making speeches to the jury.

Meanwhile, Assistant U.S. Attorney M. Beth Leahy was growing increasingly irritated with O'Brien's act. And Judge Nitza Quinones was getting more work than a baseball umpire because the prosecutor was objecting to virtually every question O'Brien asked. At times, Leahy objected to three questions in  a row from the doctor, objections that were all sustained by the judge.

None of which phased O'Brien, who didn't act like he was ready to give up the spotlight any time soon.

"Your Honor, the defendant is testifying," the prosecutor yelled after O'Brien finished another speech to the jury.

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Pagan Leader Rants About Pill Mill

By George Anastasia
For BigTrial.net

Sam Nocille was angry.

A leader of the outlaw motorcycle club known as the Pagans, Nocille was in prison in 2013 while associates continued to profit from a pill mill operation authorities say he helped set in motion.

The problem was that those associates had stopped kicking up to Nocille who had been receiving about $2,000-week, his share from the illegal street sales of oxycodone, methadone, Xanax and Percocet.

"All of a sudden he's changing the whole fuckin' thing," Nocille said in a phone call to his wife in which he complained about Peter Marradino, an associate who was part of the scheme. "It's not gonna happen...The door was opened for him due to me."

In another call, Nocille said of Marradino, "I'm gonna split his fuckin' head."

The Nocille tapes (all prison phone calls are recorded)  were played along with several others today in the trial of Dr. William O'Brien 3d whose medical offices, authorities allege, were the nerve center of a multi-million dollar pill mill operation set up by Nocille.

"Even that fat motherfucker Bill in Levitttown is gonna get it," Nocille said in another rant recorded in January 2014. One of O'Brien's office was in Levittown.

3

Pill Doctor Regrets Asking Undercover FBI Agent For A Blow Job But Says He's Innocent Of Drug Charges

By George Anastasia
For BigTrial.net

Dr. William O'Brien, charged with running a "pill mill" that dumped millions of dollars of illegal drugs onto the streets of Philadelphia and the suburbs, told a federal jury this afternoon that it was wrong for him to ask an undercover FBI agent posing as a patient for a blow job.

"I'm embarrassed and ashamed that I asked a patient for oral sex," O'Brien, who is acting as his own defense attorney, said in an opening statement to a federal court jury that will decide his fate. "I shouldn't have done it as a physician. I shouldn't have done it as a man. It was wrong."

But that was the only concession the doctor made today during a 45-minute address to the jury at the start of  his trial. For most of that time, O'Brien attacked the prosecution, claiming the government's case was built on lies and misinformation.

"They're not going to be able to prove it," O'Brien said of the charges of conspiracy, drug dealing, money-laundering and bankruptcy fraud outlined in a 140-count indictment brought against him and 10 co-defendants. "An indictment is only one side of the story...I finally get to tell my side."

All of O'Brien's co-defendants have pleaded guilty. Several are expected to testify for the government, including his ex-wife/girlfriend with whom he was living at the time of his arrest in January 2015. The jury will also hear from investigators and three exotic dancers who have said they exchanged sex for prescriptions for oxycodone, methadone and other controlled substances.

Unlike the undercover FBI agent, the dancers said they agreed to the sex-for-scripts proposal that prosecutors allege was part of a broader drug operation run out of O'Brien's offices and set up by members of the Pagans, an outlaw motorcycle gang.

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Doctor's Office Served Pagans, Pills And Prostitutes

By George Anastasia
For BigTrial.net

He was a doctor who federal authorities say turned his practice into an illegal drug distribution center for a group of outlaw bikers.

He charged $200 per visit but seldom bothered with a medical exam.

Instead, the feds say, he wrote thousands of prescriptions for oxycodone, methadone, valium and Percocet, drugs that quickly ended up on the streets. While most of his "patients" paid cash, several dancers who worked at area "gentleman's clubs" exchanged sex for scripts.

Over a two-year period, authorities say, Dr. William O'Brien 3d pocketed $1.8 million while his "patients," many of them members and associates of the Pagans, generated millions more in street sales. Some were pulling in as much as $10,000 a-week, according to court documents.

This week in U.S. District Court a jury will begin hearing testimony in the case against O'Brien; a case based on a two-year federal investigation that revolves around Pagans, pills and prostitutes.

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