Kauai doctor to plead guilty in drug case
LIHUE » A doctor accused of prescribing pain narcotics to patients he never met will plead guilty to a charge that arose from an Internet pharmacy in Alabama, the U.S. Attorney's Office there announced yesterday.
Dr. Harold C. Spear III, charged with prescribing hydrocodone pain pills over the Internet, insisted yesterday that his business is legitimate and that he will fight to retain his pain management practice once his license to practice is reinstated. He has not yet pleaded guilty to anything, but "I'm helping" federal authorities in Honolulu, he added.
His lawyer, Michael Green, said yesterday that "we're in the process of negotiation," and the case will "be resolved in a way other than going to trial."
The Alabama charge will be transferred to the federal court in Honolulu, where Spear is facing an additional 20 counts of prescribing OxyContin pain pills for "no legitimate medical purpose," according to federal officials in a 2007 case.
His Hanapepe clinic, now closed, was raided by the federal Food and Drug Administration, the U.S. Attorney's Office and the state Department of Public Safety in the past three years.
No state charges have been filed.
Spear, 56, of Hanapepe, said he was only trying to help his patients heal.
The Alabama-based William and Mary Pharmacy, Spear added, made hydrocodone without anti-inflammatories like Tylenol, he said.
"Prescribing opiates was a bridge" to get his patients off the anti-inflammatories, the doctor added. "Anti-inflammatories inhibit healing."
But Birmingham-based U.S. Attorney Alice H. Martin said in a release yesterday that between January 2004 and December 2005, Spear was paid $482,027 to write prescriptions for the pharmacy and was solicited by the pharmacy for his willingness to prescribe medications over the phone and Internet without face-to-face examinations. He has agreed to forfeit property acquired with the profits, she added.
Spear said yesterday that he is in training with doctors at the University of California at San Diego for boundaries training and proper prescribing methods. He expects to have his license reinstated in the summer but will no longer prescribe pain pills.
He insists that "dial-a-doc" examinations via the phone and Internet are the future of medicine. But he is relieved he can no longer prescribe narcotics. It was a condition of his release from jail here. "I'm over pain management, quite frankly," he said. "I don't have to be a cop anymore."
He faces a five-year prison term after he pleads guilty to the charge of prescribing hydrocodone pain pills over the Internet in Alabama, plus whatever comes from the 20 counts still outstanding here.
"There is a lot of jail time, potentially," Green added.
