Doctor sentenced for illegally prescribing Oxycodone and tax fraud

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Dr. Sheikh Ahmed, 57, of Orange, Connecticut was sentenced today, Sept. 29, 2020, by U.S. District Judge Victor A. Bolden in Bridgeport to six months of imprisonment, followed by three years of supervised release, for illegally prescribing oxycodone, and failing to pay employee withholding taxes to the Internal Revenue Service.

Ahmed was arrested on November 28, 2018.  On November 8, 2019, he pleaded guilty to one count of prescribing outside the scope of medical practice, and one count of willful failure to pay withholding taxes.

Ahmed has made full restitution to the IRS, according to the press release from the U.S. Attorney for the District of Connecticut.

Ahmed, who is released on a $200,000 bond, is required to report to prison on November 10.

According to court documents and statements made in court, as detailed in the press release, Ahmed is a pediatrician who operated a medical practice, under the name East Hartford Medical Center, at 580 Burnside Avenue in East Hartford.

Despite being a pediatrician, Ahmed’s practice did not only focus on children, investigators found.

Between December 2017 and May 2018, Ahmed prescribed controlled substances, including Oxycodone, to two individuals outside the scope of professional medical practice, charging $500 to issue prescriptions for 30-day supplies of Oxycodone. Ahmed also agreed to increase the patients’ dosage in the future, without discussion as to the medical justification for the increase, counseling them about the need to increase dosages gradually to avoid scrutiny from pharmacies regarding the prescribed medications.

Ahmed also had the patients bypass normal financial intake procedures and took cash payments directly from the patients. Ahmed failed to perform sufficient examinations to assess the patients’ pain levels prior to issuing the prescriptions, prosecutors said.

The investigation also revealed that Ahmed failed to pay over to the Internal Revenue Service $117,893 in employee withholding taxes from five of his businesses, including East Hartford Medical Center, between 2013 and 2016.