DEA PARTLY ATTRIBUTES OVERDOSE DEATHS OF 23 TO N.C. DOCTOR WHO PRESCRIBED
PAINKILLERS

GROVER (AP) - At least 23 former patients of a Cleveland County doctor died
in part from drug overdoses, according to a document presented to the
physician by federal drug agents.

Dr. Joseph Talley is accused of over-prescribing narcotics and illegally
hoarding controlled drugs returned by patients, according to a U.S. Drug
Enforcement Administration order obtained by The Shelby Star.

The document, signed by DEA chief Asa Hutchinson, calls Talley "an imminent
danger to the public health and safety."

Details of the deaths were outlined in the DEA's "show cause" order - a
list of allegations delivered to Talley last week, the Star reported yesterday.

Talley has not been criminally charged but faces accusations by the North
Carolina Medical Board that he violated medical ethics and improperly
dispensed narcotics. A hearing on those allegations is scheduled for March 22.

DEA agents entered Talley's Grover Medical Clinic on Jan. 30, taking his
federal drug license and confiscating all the narcotics in the office.
Agents had seized patient records in December.

Talley, 64, has admitted to prescribing large dosages of opioids - powerful
opium-based drugs including morphine and OxyContin - to patients for
chronic pain.

He has 3,000 patients nationwide, some of whom have praised his practice on
Web sites for pain sufferers.

The DEA document outlines specific accusations against Talley, the Star
reported.

For example, a 50-year-old man identified as "Roger H." died of an overdose
of the painkiller Oxycodone. Talley's office had been notified three months
earlier that the man had been in drug rehabilitation, the document said.

The patient had more than 10 times the therapeutic level of Oxycodone in
his body. Talley had prescribed 120 Oxycodone pills a month to Roger H.,
according to the document.

"I did not prescribe an excessive amount," Talley said Wednesday. "He had
been taking it for some time, and if he had 10 times the amount, it was not
because I had prescribed that much."

In response to accusations that patients were observed selling controlled
substances in his office parking lot, Talley said: "If I knew any patient
sold any medication, they were out of here. If it were law enforcement who
saw this, why didn't they act?"

The N.C. Medical Examiner's Office sent the DEA copies of six autopsy
reports of former patients of Talley's who had died of causes related to
Oxycodone ingestion