THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, February 19, 1997 TAG: 9702190387
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B7 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: STAFF REPORT
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: 26 lines
A retired psychiatrist who wrote more than 30 fraudulent prescriptions last year, mainly for narcotics for himself and his wife, was sentenced Tuesday to three years' probation.
The defendant, Dr. Bernard William Freund, 63, of Portsmouth, also was sentenced to 30 days' home confinement with electronic monitoring and ordered to participate in drug abuse and mental health programs.
Freund was sentenced by Judge Henry C. Morgan Jr. in federal court in Norfolk.
Freund pleaded guilty in November to fraudulently obtaining controlled substances, almost all painkillers, anti-anxiety drugs or sleeping pills, including Valium, Halcion, Percocet and Ambien and some appetite suppressants. He called in the prescriptions for more than 2,000 doses, or about 166 doses per month, in the 12 months of 1995. Freund practiced in Virginia Beach and Norfolk.
Prosecutors say he or his wife called in the prescriptions in another person's name to pharmacies in Norfolk, Virginia Beach and Portsmouth, then picked up the prescriptions and kept them for their use.