Pharmacists jailed for selling black market pills
Pair used business to cover for wholesale to Caribbean
APAIR of pharmacists who illegally supplied sleeping tablets to the black market have both been jailed.
Dean Dookhan and Narvinder Nandra used their Solihull-based chemists as cover to wholesale more than 20,000 packets of Zolpidem to a mystery figure in Trinidad and Tobago for a profit.
Having previously pleaded guilty to supplying a controlled Class C drug to another and possessing a medicinal product for the purpose of wholesale distribution without a licence, they were jailed at Birmingham Crown Court this week.
Dookhan, aged 40, from Sherwood Road, Hall Green was sentenced to 27 months, while Nandra, 48, of Primsland Close, Solihull received a slightly longer term of 30 months after lying about his role in the racket.
Judge Francis Laird QC said: “Pharmacists are trusted to purchase, store and supply under prescription a variety of drugs, some of which are controlled under the Misuse of Drugs Act.
“It’s for that reason that selling a controlled drug on the black market is such a serious offence.”
He added: “You both played a leading role and are equally culpable in the offences. You both grossly abused your position as pharmacists and the business premises which you worked to carry out the offences.”
Dookhan worked at Northbrook Pharmacy in Shirley and was responsible for ordering the Zolpidem from suppliers.
He then transferred it to Nandra, employed by Gospel Lane Pharmacy in Olton, who packaged and exported it, via Royal Mail and then a freight forwarder.
In doing so he would misdescribe the shipments as ‘medicinal products’ to disguise the fact they contained a controlled drug.
Nandra also destroyed the original invoices for the Zolpidem then falsified new ones.
Between September 2015 and May 2016 the pair managed to shift 20,790 packets – equal to 582,120 individual tablets – to their Caribbean contact who was not a legitimate pharmacist.
However, there is no evidence as to what happened to the pills once they were abroad.
Similarly, save for a one-off £2,800 payment to Nandra’s bank account, it is not known exactly how much the pair made from the scheme.
The court heard they paid between £9,000 and £10,000 for the tablets in the first place and likely ‘doubled their money’.
But the operation came crashing
down after the owners of Northbrook Pharmacy became suspicious at the volume of Zolpidem being ordered.
The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) launched an investigation, during which Dookhan tried to shift the blame on to an innocent colleague.
After being arrested and charged Nandra pleaded guilty on a ‘basis’ claiming he did not know he was breaking the law by wholesaling the items.
But Judge Laird ‘comprehensively rejected’ his account at a trial hearing after concluding he ‘lied constantly’ about his involvement.
In mitigation the court was told that both defendants were married family men with several children while many people had wrote ‘impressive’ references for them.
Their prison terms were reduced for their respective guilty pleas, previous good character, the fact its been five years since the offences as well as the harsher conditions in jail due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
But both sentences remained greater than two years meaning they could not be suspended.
Judge Laird added: “I recognise for you the custodial sentence will have a devastating effect upon you and your immediate family.”