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Nassau County resident Feroze Nazirbage of Bellerose, age 50, and Larchmont resident Mordechai Bar, age 71, were both arrested on Wednesday, June 5 and charged with illegally diverting oxycodone and other controlled substances, the US Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York announced.
According to federal officials, Nazirbage, who is associated with several pharmacies in and around New York City, and Bar, who has a practice in New Rochelle, both worked to dispense controlled substances illegally by filling and providing prescriptions not issued for a legitimate medical purpose.
Nazirbage, the president of F&N Pharmacy who also works with QV Pharmacy, allegedly conspired to dispense these substances in exchange for cash beginning in December 2022. In addition to filling illegitimate prescriptions, Nazirbage also sold opioids to customers without prescriptions as part of "backdoor sales," officials said.
During one of these sales, Nazirbage allegedly gave the customer a handwritten menu of various drugs and their per-pill cost for future sales:
Additionally, beginning in January 2023, Bar would conspire with others to provide illegitimate prescriptions for oxycodone, amphetamine, and alprazolam to patients in exchange for cash, according to federal officials.
These prescriptions would be issued by Bar without medical examinations and oftentimes without any meetings with the patients, officials added.
Nazirbage and Bar are both charged with one count of conspiring to illegally dispense or distribute oxycodone and other controlled substances and several counts of dispensing or distributing oxycodone and other controlled substances. They face a maximum sentence of decades in prison.
US Attorney Damian Williams condemned the duo's alleged actions, calling them "no more than common drug dealing operations."
"Dr. Mordechai Bar and Feroze Nazirbage breached the trust that was placed in them to prescribe and dispense controlled substances only for legitimate medical purposes," Williams said, adding, "We will not tolerate the illegal sale of oxycodone and other addictive substances into the community, whether those sales take place on the street corner, at a doctor’s office, or behind a pharmacy counter.”
Anyone with more information regarding the investigation into Nazirbage and Bar is asked to contact Drug Enforcement Administration Victim/Witness Coordinator James Lee at James.H.Lee@dea.gov or by calling (646) 529-4042.
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