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Noel Blackman for January sentencing
Former Minister of Health, Dr. Noel Blackman, who is facing charges in the US for illegally distributing prescription drugs, is facing a January date for sentencing.
For January sentencing: Noel Blackman
On Wednesday, Blackman, who was arrested at JFK while coming back earlier this year to take up his position as Chairman of the Board for the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC), appeared in a New York court and withdrew his not guilty plea and admitted to one count of the two indictments.
Blackman had made a deal with US prosecutors and signaled his intentions to plead guilty. He will continue to remain in custody as prosecutors had argued he remains a high flight risk.
Federal authorities earlier in the year had taken the 68-year-old doctor into custody after they ordered a Guyana-bound jet, taxiing for takeoff, to return to an airport terminal.
Prior to his arrest, investigators had the doctor and his Brooklyn office under surveillance for weeks.
The David Granger administration subsequently named Dr. Carl ‘Max’ Hanoman as the new GPHC Chairman.
Blackman has been in custody since his arrest with prosecutors fearing that he will flee if allowed on bail.
Prosecutors said that Blackman had illegally prescribed vast amounts of a painkiller drug in what has been described as a “drug-dealing enterprise spanning three states.”
The doctor and his assistant, Eva Torres, 31, of the Bronx, were indicted on two counts: conspiracy to distribute oxycodone and distribution of a controlled substance.
Prosecutors had signaled intentions to seize any of Blackman’s assets that they could link to illegal activities.
Records show Dr. Blackman wrote 114 prescriptions in 2014 for about 3,800 oxycodone pills and nearly 2,500 prescriptions for about 365,000 pills last year.
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