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a 45-year-old ann arbor doctor and convicted drug dealer has been indicted on federal charges of illegally prescribing more than 1 million doses of narcotic painkillers.
dr. stuart w. bilyeu was charged in a 10-count indictment in u.s. district court in detroit with distributing xanax, vicodin, valium, oxycontin and methadone. over a 15-month period ending in april 2004, he prescribed 777,000 doses of vicodin, 330,000 doses of xanax and 156,000 doses of valium, the grand jury charged.
bilyeu was the no. 1 purchaser of 10-mg doses of vicodin in the state in 2003 and part of 2004. he ranked 14th highest in the united states in prescribing other vicodin pills and had about 1,400 patients.
in october 2003, the drug enforcement administration began investigating bilyeu, after pharmacists and local police raised questions about the high number of prescriptions he was issuing. people could get narcotic prescriptions using a blockbuster card as an id, the dea said.
melvindale detective danny cadez posed as a patient in july 2003 at bilyeu's office. his visit consisted of the doctor "looking at and touching his back for approximately five seconds. dr. bileu then asked cadez, 'what do you want?'" said a 28-page affidavit filed by dea investigator roberta e. goralczyk.
the dea compared bilyeu's prescription rate to seven doctors who advertise themselves as pain management doctors -- and found bilyeu had prescribed more xanax, vicodin, valium and oxycontin than the seven doctors combined.
abuse of prescription drugs by young people remains a serious problem. the university of michigan's monitoring the future study of drug use by students reported in december that 9.3 percent of high school seniors had used vicodin, while the abuse of oxycontin by high school seniors rose from 4 percent in 2002 to 5 percent in 2004.
"considering the addictive potential of this drug (oxycontin), which is a powerful synthetic narcotic used to control pain, we think that these are disturbingly high rates of involvement by america's young people," said lloyd johnston, the study's principal investigator.
the dea said one of bilyeu's patients, steven ridner, died feb. 12 from an accidental drug overdose. a wayne county autopsy showed high levels of methadone. bilyeu was arraigned and released on a $10,000 personal bond aug. 19. u.s. district judge robert h. cleland set an oct. 14 trial date. his attorney, douglas mullkoff, didn't return calls seeking comment friday.
bilyeu had been investigated in the early 1990s and was charged by michigan authorities in 1992 with illegally selling prescriptions and marijuana. he pleaded guilty and was sentenced to lifetime probation, the dea said. his medical license was suspended.
in 1994, the lifetime probation was changed to a three-year probation. in 2000, bilyeu was reissued a medical license, and the dea issued him a new license to dispense controlled substances. bilyeu opened the down river pain clinic on telegraph in taylor and moved it to detroit earlier this year.
i had to post this story, after all, i used to see this doctor...
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