Image source, Getty Images
- author, Max Matza
- role, BBC News
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US investigators have arrested the founder and CEO of a telemedicine company for running a $100 million (£78 million) scheme to illegally distribute more than 40 million pills of Adderall and other controlled substances.
Attorney General Merrick Garland said Dawn CEO Lucia He conspired with the company’s clinical president, David Brody, “to provide easy access to Adderall and other stimulants without any legitimate medical purpose.”
The U.S.’s chief legal officer said the executives exploited telehealth rules that were relaxed during the coronavirus pandemic.
Done Global, a San Francisco-based startup, gained popularity during the pandemic as a way to get Adderall online for a monthly fee.
Authorities said Mr He was arrested in Los Angeles and Dr Brody was arrested in San Rafael, California.
Both men are charged with distribution of a controlled substance and could each face up to 20 years in prison if convicted.
Adderall is a medication that helps manage ADHD symptoms, such as the inability to focus on a single task.
The allegations come amid a nationwide shortage of the drug.
Chief Deputy Attorney General Nicole Argentieri accused the pair of “spending millions of dollars on deceptive social media advertising.”
“This indictment marks the Department of Justice’s first criminal drug distribution prosecution involving remote medical prescriptions through a digital health company,” Argentieri said in a statement.
The alleged scheme also involves increasing membership fees, thereby increasing the value of the company and resulting in “illegal profits.”
The defendants also allegedly limited the information available to prescribers and instructed them to prescribe medications even when patients were not medically qualified.
Done patients were also allegedly required to complete an initial screening with their prescribing physician in less than 30 minutes.
Authorities say he continued his illegal scheme “even after he learned that materials had been posted on online social networks about how Dawn could be used to easily obtain Adderall and other stimulants and that Dawn members had overdosed and died.”
They are also accused of defrauding government health assistance programs Medicare and Medicaid and pharmacies out of at least $14 million, and of conspiring to obstruct justice by deleting documents and emails.
