BUCKS PHARMACIST ACCUSED OF ILLEGAL SALES

Lewis Winokur, 63, Is Charged With Helping Supply The Street Trade Of
OxyContin. It's The Third Arrest Of A Medical Professional In Recent Weeks
Involving The Painkiller.

For the third time in recent weeks, a Philadelphia-area medical
professional has been charged with helping supply the growing and lucrative
street trade in the popularly abused cancer painkiller OxyContin.

Bucks County pharmacist Lewis Winokur, 63, a manager at Shelly's Pharmacy
No. 8 in Bristol Township, was charged yesterday with illegally dispensing
the drug and other potentially deadly medications, such as the sedative Xanax.

Officials said Winokur produced bogus blank prescription slips on his home
computer, sold them for $50 to $100, and then used them to fill
prescriptions at the pharmacy where he has worked for several years.

"Anybody who is drug-dealing understands that when you are putting those
amount of pills out there, someone is going to die," Bucks County District
Attorney Diane E. Gibbons said. "Once a pharmacist becomes a criminal, he
has unlimited access to drugs that he can then get onto the streets."

Winokur was arrested at his home in North Wales, Montgomery County,
yesterday morning by state drug agents and county detectives. The 1960
graduate of the Temple School of Pharmacy was arraigned before District
Justice Joanne V. Kline and sent to the Bucks County prison with bail set
at $1 million.

Winokur used the names of real patients - some now deceased - and
physicians on his prescriptions, Gibbons said.

"This is an educated man, a licensed pharmacist, who could have made a lot
of money with his education . . . but he chose to deal drugs and put
thousands of pills on the streets," Gibbons said.

Bensalem physician Richard G. Paolino was arrested in March on charges that
he illegally prescribed thousands of doses of OxyContin and Xanax, fueling
a deadly epidemic of drug abuse in the Fishtown, Kensington and Port
Richmond neighborhoods of Philadelphia.

John Levin, a Northeast Philadelphia physician, was arrested in February on
unrelated charges that he sold the painkiller with the help of his
secretary at St. Joseph's Hospital.

State drug investigators said yesterday that they have focused on OxyContin
prescriptions and sales since late last summer, when street sales of the
drug began to soar. The potentially addictive painkiller has been linked to
at least six deaths in Philadelphia in the last six months.

Another pharmacist in the eight-store Shelly's chain, Steve Chesin, played
a prominent role in Paolino's arrest, joining other area pharmacists in
alerting state and federal investigators about the physician's alleged
activities.

State drug investigators said yesterday that several of Paolino's
prescriptions were found in Winokur's pharmacy, the third-largest wholesale
purchaser of OxyContin in the five-county Philadelphia area. Investigators
would not comment on any connection that may exist between Winokur and Paolino.

Police and medical experts say the morphine-like drug is popular among
teens and street dealers because of the heroin-like high the pills produce
when broken or crushed.

Winokur sold at least 11 prescriptions to a police informant on at least
five days in early April, Gibbons said. She said the "controlled buys"
netted thousands of pills with a retail value of about $1,500 and an
estimated street value of $20,000.

Bristol Township police started investigating Winokur in March after
receiving several tips, Gibbons said.

"We used a confidential informant to enter into the pharmacy and illegally
purchase pretty much any drug we wanted," Gibbons said.

According to an affidavit of probable cause, Winokur used information from
legitimate prescriptions filled at the pharmacy to create blank
prescriptions on his home computer. He allegedly sold those fakes at $50 to
$100 each, giving buyers a list of customers, doctors, and prescription
types and quantities.

The buyers then wrote out the prescriptions, forging one of the doctors'
signatures, and Winokur filled the prescriptions at Shelly's. Winokur also
gave the buyers copies of doctors' signatures.

Winokur is charged with unlawful use of a computer, tampering with public
records or documents, and 11 counts each of delivery of a controlled
substance by a practitioner and delivery of a controlled substance. If
convicted, he would face more than 100 years in prison and receive at least
$1 million in fines.

Winokur's lawyer, Robert Rosen, argued after the arraignment yesterday that
the $1 million bail was "preposterous" and that his client posed no risk to
the community. Kline said the high bail was needed because "there is a
danger to the community . . . and [Winokur] has shown a complete and total
disregard for the community."

After the hearing, both Rosen and Winokur's wife, Diane M. Winokur,
declined to comment. Representatives from Shelly's were unavailable for
comment yesterday.

In the affidavit, investigators said a confidential informant became
friendly with Winokur, asking him "for extra pills without a valid
prescription. [Winokur] agreed and provided [the informant] with extra
pills, which were mainly methadone."

The informant told investigators, according to the affidavit, that Winokur
later gave him prescriptions printed from Winokur's home computer.

Investigators do not believe any doctors, patients or other pharmacy
employees were involved, Gibbons said.

Gibbons said the informant received about $1,000 a week in prescription
drugs from Winokur, ordering five or six different prescriptions, including
OxyContin, and getting 60 to 120 pills each time.

Gibbons said that while Winokur is being charged with 11 "controlled buys,"
investigators have seized his home computer and prescription records from
the store and are continuing their investigation.

Police also seized Winokur's 1995 Dodge Intrepid - whose vanity license
plate is PILLS - under the drug forfeiture act, Gibbons said.