Frank D. Lazzerini, MD, 41, a family practitioner in Massillon, Ohio, was convicted on June 18, 2019 of 187 charges involving controlled drugs. He had been originally indicted on 272 counts in Feb, 2018, including drug trafficking of opioids, sedatives, anti-anxiety pills, non-opioid painkillers, a steroid and stimulants used to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and two counts of involuntary manslaughter due to the deaths of 2 patients in 2014. He was acquitted of the 76 charges involving non-pain medications. This proves that most of the convictions of doctors in America is based on the anti-opioid propaganda that the government has brainwashed Americans about for the last 20 years.
Why was Dr. Lazzerini targeted?
- The largest hospital chain in Ohio—Mercy Medical Center supposedly “tipped” the police in 2015. Dr. Lazzerini was a competitor.
- Lazzerini was a high prescriber for controlled substances in Ohio.
- He treated the “expendable” population
“I was never anything but a good doctor who took care of poor people and I think I’m getting a bum rap.” Lazzerini said. “I never gave a prescription to anybody who wasn’t a patient of mine and didn’t need it. …I treated a lot of the indigent patients nobody else wanted to see. And I was trying to do everything, including pain management under one roof. … I always treated the patients and gave them what they needed.”
So they raided his office without just cause in 2016. He was arrested in Feb, 2018, two years after the raid. He pleaded not guilty, but was held in county jail on a $5 million bond for over a year until his trial. This prevents an innocent victim from working on his defense.
Stark County Prosecutor John D. Ferrero made the usual propaganda-filled accusations through the media to tamper with the jury pool of Dr. Lazzerini operating a “pill mill” to make money and getting improper reimbursement from Medicaid. Collaborators in the conspiracy who reap the benefits of forfeiture were the Ohio Board of Pharmacy and State Medical Board, Jackson Township Police, the Stark County Metropolitan Narcotics Unit, the Ohio Attorney General’s Office, the FBI and the DEA.
Because there was no just cause for the raid, the defense attorneys tried to get the court to follow the rule of law and exclude illegally obtained evidence from the raid. Jackson Township police Officer Jason Hall, a member of the Stark County Metropolitan Narcotics Task Force, lied to get the search warrant without probable cause.
The defense also made a motion to suppress the testimony of the confidential informants. These are planted liars who give the doctor a story of having pain, and then in the court testify that they didn’t really have pain, so the doctor prescribed without legitimate medical purpose. If the courts followed the rule of law, these entrapping government plants would not be allowed to give testimony. The prosecution’s argument to allow the testimony was that Dr. Lazzerini prescribed a “high level” of narcotics, and that 70 to 90 percent of Lazzerini’s patients were seeking pain medication. But since when is that a crime? The prosecution even calls these people “patients”, which is an automatic exclusion from Controlled Substance Act prosecution.
This shows the collusion between prosecutors and the court. The motions were denied. Obviously without the illegally procured evidence, the prosecution didn’t have a case. As usual, it took the prosecution 2 years to “construct” the case against Dr. Lazzerini. Even Ferrero admitted that it took two years to obtain the indictment because they had to go through the patient records. So basically, they didn’t have an actual charge of handing out a prescription to a “non-patient”, which is what the CSA requires.
Ferrero spread government propaganda through the media stating “one reason for the opiate crisis is some doctors have overprescribed opiates for pain relief to drum up business and revenue. Patients then got addicted to the medication and when they lost access to it, they sought dangerous, illegal opioid drugs and many died from overdoses.” But in reality, it is the government closing the doctors’ offices that creates the movement to street drugs. Assistant Stark County Prosecutor Toni Schnellinger shows this when she said
“the convictions did take out an individual that was prescribing opiates and opioids to individuals and then, as you saw during the trial, a lot of those turned to heroin afterwards… ”
So how could the jury reach a guilty verdict on a legitimate doctor treating legitimate patients? I base the decision purely on the brainwashed public and the media propaganda before trial. That’s why they believed the “in it for the money” Benedict Arnold prosecution’s expert witness Dr. Theodore Parran, Jr, who sells his soul to the devil for money. His testimony was the crux of the prosecution’s case. Presented as a supposed drug addiction expert, he actually only completed a residency in internal medicine but has an “interest” in addiction medicine.
The defense’s expert witness, however, was a pain management doctor from Rochester, N.Y., who testified that Dr. Lazzerini’s treatments were legitimate. Nine former patients also testified that he treated them for bonafide medical issues.
So another innocent physician goes to prison for doing his job. If you want this Injustice System to end, join us on DoctorsofCourage. Learn the REAL Cause of Drug Abuse and spread the word to everyone you know.
Addendum:
Dr. Lazzerini was sentenced to 113 years in prison. He appealed his conviction and lost in June, 2021. According to a media article, he is serving his time in the Richland Correctional Institute and is is up for parole in 2131 when he will be around 150 years old. Something for him to look forward to!
To end these attacks, restore pain management, and provide compensation to all the families that have been destroyed by government overreach, we must get the Controlled Substance Act repealed. Join Doctorsofcourage to get that done. Learn what we teach and spread the word. NO DRUG CAUSES ADDICTION!! Let’s end the War on Drugs, Doctors and Pain Patients, end the black market, solve the southern border crisis, and restore proper pain management. It CAN be done!
Addendum:
I have failed in my mission to end these attacks on doctors and pain patients. Through John Bevere’s book The Bait of Satan, I have figured out why—my lack of forgiveness to those who attacked me. As in Mark 11: 24-26:
Therefore I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them. And whenever you stand praying, if you have anything against anyone, forgive him, that your Father in heaven may also forgive you your trespasses. But if you do not forgive, neither will your Father in heaven forgive your trespasses.
And when you do not do the will of the Father, you are estranged from him and he will ignore you. So we all must forgive the agents who attacked us in order for things to be made right through any of our works.
Jesus said
“Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.”
But we cannot lay down our lives for God unless we know Him well enough to trust Him. We must have the assurance that He would never do anything to harm us. He always looks out for what He knows is in our best interest. As a nation, those of us suffering from these attacks must understand that we are serving as God’s messengers of love. We must forgive those who persecute us and love them instead, following God’s will for us. Then and only then will we see fruits from our labor.
So I hope that everyone who has suffered from what happened to Dr. Lazzerini can trust the Lord, forgive those who have hurt you, and help bring this country back to the God-fearing country that our forefathers founded. Then, and only then, can you be a part of the effort to stop these attacks. I look forward to that day.
Linda Cheek is a teacher and disenfranchised medical doctor, turned activist, author, and speaker. A victim of prosecutorial misconduct and outright law-breaking of the government agencies DEA, DHHS, and DOJ, she hopes to be a part of exonerating all doctors illegally attacked through the Controlled Substance Act. She holds the key to success, as she can offset the government propaganda that drugs cause addiction with the truth: The REAL Cause of Drug Abuse.
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As a treatment counselor, I just have to say, that most of my clients became heroin addicts after being given opiate pain medication over a long period of time, and then it is suddenly stopped. There is a serious opiate problem in the United States killing our young people and it all started with doctors overprescribing pain medication.
Sorry, but you are wrong. You need to watch the video on the video page, The REAL Cause of Drug Abuse. You believe the propaganda, and are spreading it with your lack of knowledge. Do better. Learn the truth and you can help people cure their addiction. But, of course, if it is a matter of job security, you might not choose to do that. But I can guarantee that there are enough people heading for addiction because of the REAL cause, that you won’t have to worry. In fact, if you learn how to cure them, you could have a roaring business.
Addition doesn’t come from the doctor perscribing them medicine. Addition happens when these patients decide their not getting enough and go out into the streets to obtain more. If they didn’t seek after more they wouldn’t over dose. In this day and age the drugs they buy off the Street aren’t what there suppose to be, there lachs with fetynol and other dangerous drugs. So how does that make it the doctors fault that people go after more? If the doctor is over perscribing why would the patient need to see more elsewhere and risk it being a poisonous drug. If the doctor is doing this to get rich quick, why would they not be able to post bond while they sit and wait out a 2 year trial? You would think they’d have plenty of money to be out of jail waiting. These patients who does from over medication is 99.9% most likely done on their own with or without medication from a doctor they would have got the drugs and died. They died from addiction not the doctor. When prescribed the medicine you are told to only take a certain amount and these patients who have died have taken way over the amount prescribed, so how is that the doctors fault?
Thank you for working on this Dr. Cheek. Frank’s appeal has been submitted for review and goes before the court next week, 5/11/21. I am his sister and I can honestly say that this has been a nightmare for him and for our entire family. It is so unfair and awful. Frank has saved three lives while he is prison. He saved two men who had overdosed on synthetic drugs that were smuggled into the prison (the prisons are overrun with illegal drugs) and one who had an acute blockage in his liver and was septic. He is a good man and a great doctor who was made a scapegoat. Please keep fighting this unjust witch hunt and pray that we can get him out of prison so his life and education is not wasted. He desperately wants to be free so he can work and be a productive member of society. He does not belong in prison.
May I say that all family, friends and patients of pain management physicians need to be supporting members of DoC so that we can get the incarcerated freed, and stop the attacks on the naive newbies. One member of each doctor’s family can be an ambassador member on his/her behalf. But others should be willing to put less than the price of a fast food meal per month to help the cause.
I took my brother who is an alcoholic & has multiple pain issues to Dr. L. He took time with us & did NOT prescribe any pain meds but referred him to an Orthopedic Dr. I hate seeing how his life has been ruined & that of his family. He was such a fantastic & caring Dr.
It’s just plain awful what they are doing to these poor doctors. Sure there have been a few that were not doing the right thing but 99 percent have done the correct thing treating legit patients. So now we all pay the price of a few. What about the great doctors out there, why do they have to be afraid to treat their patients? Here’s a concept, go after the drug smugglers and dealers who are the real criminals instead of going after good doctors and patients!
Since the first doctor attacked, James Graves, MD in Florida, there has not been a single legitimate attack on a doctor actually breaking the Controlled Substance Act which requires the doctor to stand on the street corner selling scripts for cash. If you know of such a doctor, please let me know. Stop believing the propaganda.
Dr. Lazzerini was sentenced to 113 years in prison. Folks, we have to come together, stop these atrocities, and get these innocent physicians exonerated. This is SO wrong!