Pharmacy pair in pill mill bust

A pharmacist and a drugstore technician were arrested Tuesday and charged with using fake prescriptions to divert millions of dollars in oxycodone from a Queens pharmacy, officials said.

Special Narcotics Prosecutor Bridget Brennan said pharmacist Victor LaPerla (bottom photo) and technician Bianca Martinez (top photo) conspired to fill hundreds of illegitimate prescriptions for 30-milligram oxycodone pills at the Richmond Hill pharmacy where they worked, and sold additional oxycodone pills in unlabeled bottles for which there were no prescriptions.

An outside partner and others paid cash for the pills and resold them on the black market, Brennan said.

LaPerla, 64, of Plainview, and Martinez, 33, of Brooklyn, were charged with conspiracy, criminal possession of a controlled substance by a pharmacist and criminal possession of a forged instrument.

The pair, who worked at Dale Pharmacy & Surgical Inc. on Jamaica Ave., pleaded not guilty.

“She doesn’t prescribe pills,” said Martinez’s lawyer. “She doesn’t give the pills. She enters it into the computer.”

Judge Ann Scherzer ordered LaPerla held on $250,000 or $150,000 cash, and ordered Martinez held on $50,000, or $25,000 cash.

Among the prescriptions they filled were pills for two doctors whose prescription pads were stolen and whose signatures were forged, according to an indictment. Investigators determined nearly 158,000 pills had been dispensed via the fake prescriptions. The black market value is estimated to be between $2 million and $4 million.