DOCTOR IN PAIN-PILL CASE TO PLEAD GUILTY

South Shore Clinic Was Focus Of Drug Probe

Dr. David H. Procter, whose clinic in South Shore was at the center of an
investigation of prescription pain pill abuse in northeastern Kentucky,
will plead guilty Monday to federal drug charges, according to his lawyer
and the federal prosecutor handling the case.

Procter, who was scheduled to go on trial Monday in U.S. District Court in
Ashland, filed the motion yesterday asking to enter a guilty plea instead.

A plea agreement negotiated with prosecutors recommends a sentence of about
10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine, said the lawyer, Scott C. Cox of
Louisville.

Three doctors Procter recruited to work in his clinic in 1999 and 2000 have
been convicted in federal and state courts of illegally prescribing
medications at other clinics in the area after going out on their own.

A fourth, Dr. Rodolfo Santos, is now on trial in Greenup Circuit Court,
where he stands accused of illegally prescribing painkillers last year for
a patient at Procter's Plaza Healthcare clinic.

"The doctor decided it would be in his best interest to put this behind
him, and to accept responsibility for his actions," Cox said, adding that
federal prosecutors' evidence against Procter was "sufficient for us to
enter plea negotiations with them."

Patrick Molloy, the assistant United States attorney who is prosecuting
Procter, confirmed yesterday that the doctor "will change his plea from not
guilty to guilty." Molloy declined to comment further.

Two women who worked in

Procter's clinic, Nancy Sadler and Mary Katherine Dials, also are scheduled
to go on trial Monday, but Sadler's lawyer said he began discussing a plea
agreement with Molloy this week after learning of Procter's agreement.

"We have not received a formal offer. We have not indicated whether we will
or will not accept anything," said Steve Hillman, Sadler's lawyer.

Sadler, of West Portsmouth, Ohio, and Dials, of Stout, Ohio, were described
in the July 15, 2002, indictment as office managers of Procter's clinic.
Dials' lawyer was out of the office yesterday and could not be reached.

U.S. District Judge Henry Wilhoit ultimately will determine Procter's
sentence, based on federal sentencing guidelines and on the extent of his
cooperation with federal prosecutors in other cases.

"The parties have agreed that the appropriate sentence absent any
reductions for cooperation is approximately 10 years, but I am hopeful that
the government will ask the court to reduce that sentence if Dr. Procter
cooperates with them," Cox said. "But ultimately it's a decision for Judge
Wilhoit."

If he had gone to trial and been convicted of all four counts in his
indictment, Procter, 52, could have been sentenced to up to 20 years in
prison and a fine of $1 million.

The plea agreement calls for dismissing one count alleging that Procter
distributed and dispensed controlled substances to a patient without a
legitimate medical purpose. But he agreed to plead guilty to the identical
charge concerning two other patients and to conspiring with others to
illegally distribute, dispense and possess controlled substances between
1996 and June 2002.

During that period, South Shore, an Ohio River town with 1,200 residents,
became a magnet for "doctor shoppers" from Kentucky, Ohio, West Virginia
and other states -- addicts who visit multiple doctors and pharmacists,
often on the same day, to feed their narcotic habit.

The parking lot outside Procter's clinic became an open-air drug market,
according to law-enforcement officials. Patients would pay $120 in cash for
an office visit, fill their prescriptions at a drugstore in the same
shopping center and then sell the pills outside, officials said.

At least nine of the patients who obtained drugs from Procter's clinic died
of overdoses in recent years, according to the federal Drug Enforcement
Administration and the Greenup County coroner.

The Kentucky Board of Medical Licensure suspended Procter's medical license
in 1999, alleging that he had engaged in oral sex with two patients and had
intercourse with a third patient in exchange for drugs.

A board consultant reviewed medical records of more than 60 patients and
concluded that Procter prescribed excessive amounts of controlled
substances, including Lorcet and Lortab, both forms of the painkiller
hydrocodone; Xanax, a tranquilizer; and Soma, a muscle relaxant. Patients
were prescribed as many as 200 pain pills a month for several years, an
average of seven a day, according to medical board records.

Procter denied the board's allegations but surrendered his license in
August 2000. He was no longer practicing by then, because of a November
1998 car accident that impaired his memory, according to court records.

Procter arranged for a series of other doctors to staff his clinic,
including Santos and the three others who have been convicted -- Steven
Snyder, Frederick Cohn and Fortune Williams.