Pill mill indictments target 4 Georgians

By Christopher Quinn

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

A federal grand jury in Cleveland indicted four Georgians last week on charges of participating in an operation to illegally distribute prescription painkillers across the United States.

The operations, known as pill mills, used doctors, the Internet and a national distribution network to sell hundreds of thousands of pills including Vicodin, Lortab and Xanax, the indictments say.

James Hazelwood, 39, of Cumming; Jennifer Ryan, also known as Jennifer Ryan Nelson, 32, of Cumming; Stephen Derks, 41, of Marietta; and Helen Kann, 50, of Atlanta were among those named in the indictments, which accused them of conspiracy to distribute drugs and money laundering.

Hazelwood owned a company called USMeds in Cumming and was described as an organizer of the operation, according to the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Ohio.

Buyers would use the Internet to find the type, quantity and strength of drug that they wanted to purchase from the two companies involved. The defendants conducted a brief telephone "consultation" and approved the orders. The defendants either shipped the drugs to customers or sent them a prescription to fill at a local pharmacy. Customers were charged eight to 10 times the retail price when the controlled substance was shipped directly. The defendants charged the customers an inflated consultation price when they supplied them with paper prescriptions.