A Barbourville City Council member of more than 20 years has had his sentencing scheduled in the Eastern District of the U.S. District Court for July 7 after pleading guilty to conspiracy to unlawfully distribute a controlled substance on March 5.
Less than 24 hours after attending a Barbourville City Council meeting as a council member, Calvin Manis, 74, pleaded guilty in front of Magistrate Judge Hanly A. Ingram. Judge Ingram later recommended U.S. District Judge Robert E. Wier accept Manis’ plea, which he did on Thursday, March 10.
Manis was arrested last summer after the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) visited three pharmacies in the Tri-County. According to an affidavit used to secure the arrest of Manis, investigators from the London DEA office and the Barbourville Police Department interviewed cooperating witnesses in August 2019.
According to Manis’ plea agreement, from December 2015 to August 2019, Manis conspired with others to divert controlled substances. Manis admits in his plea agreement to having dispensed (or caused the dispensing of) 31,332 oxycodone pills of various sizes, 434 hydrocodone pills of various sizes, and 3,966 oxymorhpone pills of various sizes.
Manis conspired with Barbourville resident John Pasternak, 53. Pasternak sponsored, or provided money and other resources to other people enabling them to obtain prescriptions, often from out-of-state doctors. Pasternak and those he sponsored would then get those prescriptions filled at Manis’s pharmacy, Parkway Pharmacy, located at 726 S. US Hwy 25E in Barbourville. Pasternak pleaded guilty on March 8.
Pasternak admits to not only providing money to sponsored individuals to cover cost of doctor’s visits and prescriptions filled at Parkway Pharmacy, but that he also provided transportation. In exchange for sponsoring individuals, Pasternak would sometimes receive some or all of the prescription drugs dispensed to said individuals, and would then would sell them for cash. In some other instances, sponsored individuals would provide cash to Pasternak after selling the drugs themselves.
Pasternak’s plea agreement states that he and Manis frequently communicated about sponsored individuals and that he would notify Manis when a sponsored individual would fill a prescription.
“Manis repeatedly agreed to fill (or instructed his employees at Parkway Pharmacy to fill) prescriptions for the sponsored individuals,” reads Pasternak’s plea agreement. “In exchange, [Pasternak] and the sponsored individuals paid Manis and other Parkway Pharmacy employees for the controlled substances at Parkway Pharmacy.”
In some instances, Pasternak would take prescriptions of sponsored individuals to Parkway Pharmacy and would obtain controlled substances, even when the sponsored individual whose name appeared on the prescription was not in the pharmacy.
Manis filled a number of illegitimate prescriptions issued by physicians associated with EHC Medical Offices, PLLC, a putative substance abuse clinic, with locations in Jacksboro and Harriman Tennessee.
“[Manis] recognized that EHC physicians often prescribed 24MG per day of buprenorphine, often in combination with another sought-after drug like gabapentin or benzodiazepine, which the Defendant knew to be excessive as a routine prescription based on his training and experience asa pharmacist,” reads his plea agreement. “The Defendant also knew that some EHC patients were diverting and selling the medications they obtained from EHC.”
On March 4, a 27-count indictment was filed in U.S. District Court against eight physicians, a nurse, and two Kentucky men in relation to the illegitimate prescriptions issued by EHC.
Physician Robert Taylor, who founded EHC in 2013 and owned it until Nov. 2018, faces the most charges (26) in the indictment. Taylor’s charges include conspiring to distribute and dispense controlled substances in Knox, Laurel, and Whitley Counties; falsifying statements and other documents in order to receive reimbursem*nts from Medicare, Kentucky Medicaid, TennCare, and others; wire fraud; healthcare fraud; money laundering; and more.
Others named in the indictment include physician Evan Herrell, who acted as the medical director of the Jacksboro location; and physician Mark Grenoski, who acted as the medical director of the Harriman location. Lori Barnett, a registered nurse, who managed the day-to-day operations of EHC, was also named in the indictment along with physicians Keri McFarlane, Helen Bidawid, Stephen Cirelli, Eva Misra, and Matthew Rasberry, who were all associated with EHC at various points throughout the timeframe of the indictment.
Kentucky residents Elmer Powers and Brian Bunch were also named in the indictment. Bunch is currently serving a 17-year prison sentence after pleading guilty to two attempted murder charges in Knox County Circuit Court in 2016. He is accused of shooting two women at a Bailey Hollow Connector Road residence, and is currently being housed in a medium-security prison located in Boyle County.
Manis was originally indicted on a 16-count indictment, however his plea agreement sees counts 2-16 dropped.
Both Manis and Pasternak could face a maximum 20 years in prison. Part of Pasternak’s plea will see him forfeit $250,000. Manis has agreed to forfeit the property in which is pharmacy is located, and the bank account in the name of Parkway Pharmacy in the amount of $216,740.10.
On July 3, 2008 Manis pleaded guilty to a federal misdemeanor charge of misbranding a drug, which he was sentenced to three years of probation and $10,000 fine. Later that same year in October, he pleaded guilty to a related charge in the Eastern District of Kentucky court to one count of being a licensed firearms dealer who failed to maintain records of transactions at his place of business. The court subsequently sentenced him to one year imprisonment, a $15,000 fine, and a 12-month term of supervised release for his offense.
Manis has been ordered to report to the United States Marshals Services in London on March 24 at 10 a.m. He will be remanded to custody pending sentence.
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