Pharmacist sentenced for cash hydrocodone business

Friday, November 11, 2011, Vol. 35, No. 45

NASHVILLE (AP) - A Nashville pharmacist has been sentenced for the unlawful distribution of the narcotic hydrocodone and filing false income tax returns.

According to the office of the U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee, 74-year-old Glenn Brooks purchased almost two million hydrocodone and Lortab pills in 2005 and 2006 for his Brooks Pharmacy. He then sold many of the pills for cash to people without valid prescriptions. (Lortab is hydrocodone with acetaminophen.)

On Monday, U.S. District Judge Todd Campbell sentenced Brooks to one day incarceration and two years of supervised release, including 18 months home confinement.

A spokesman for the prosecutor's office said the sentence took into account the defendant's age and degenerating mental capacity.

Brooks also must forfeit $429,000 and pay almost $88,000 to the Internal Revenue Service.