Assignment
Mr. Jones is a pharmacist that is employed by ACME Drug, a national retail pharmacy chain. Maria Smith has been suffering from cancer related pain for the last nine months after having been diagnosed with breast cancer. A significant portion of her pain treatment is a medication named Mepergan Fortis, a Schedule II narcotic. This medication just happens to be Mr. Jones' drug of choice for an addiction that he has. The last time Ms. Smith had her prescription for Mepergan Fortis filled, Mr. Jones was the pharmacist on duty. Ms. Smith noticed that the medication was not working as it had in the past and she was having a significant amount of pain. She returned to the pharmacy to question if something might be different and visited with a different pharmacist. When she showed the pharmacist the medication, it was noticed that the medication actually given to the Ms. Smith was Feldene, which looks almost identical to Mepergan Fortis. The pharmacist, wondering how the mistake could have occurred since the stock bottle of Mepergan Fortis remains in a locked drawer, opened the drawer and the stock bottle that should have contained more than 60 capsules of Mepergan Fortis and recognized that it had 28 Mepergan Fortis and 32 Feldene.
The pharmacist went to the pharmacy manager, knowing that there was a security camera positioned on that portion of the pharmacy and explained what had been discovered. When the video was reviewed, it was discovered that Mr. Jones had transferred the Feldene capsules into the Mepergan Fortis bottle and put the Mepergan Fortis capsules in his pocket. The amount charged to Missouri Medicaid for the Mepergan Fortis prescription for Ms. Smith was $117.00. The amount that would have been charged to Missouri Medicaid for the Feldene that was dispensed would have been $8.97. Further investigation by ACME Drug reveals that this same issue of Mr. Jones billing for a higher cost controlled substance but dispensing a lower cost non-effective medication has likely happened to more than five other patients. Lastly, are view of the prescriptions brought into the pharmacy by the patient that were written for Mepergan Fortis had been signed by Mr. Jones after he hand wrote on the prescription, which is a legal document, that he had dispensed 60 Mepergan Fortis. This writing by Mr. Jones was an attestation of his dispensing the medication.
After reviewing your analysis regarding the potential for tort liability provided in Week Two, the Chief Operating Officer has requested that you, as Regional President of the pharmacy chain, analyze whether Mr. Jones has likely violated any criminal laws as he is debating whether or not local law enforcement should be notified so the district attorney may pursue prosecution. In your analysis, you should identify and describe the concepts behind two potential criminal claims. Your analysis should also include the societal rationales for prosecuting a criminal conduct. The COO to whom you are providing this analysis is a very busy person, so you should keep your analysis to 500 words or less. Do not include any possible negligence or products liability claims, nor any possible issues related to HIPAA in your analysis.
Include APA style citations; including in-text citations for all sources.