LEXINGTON, Ky. - A Louisiana physician has testified that it isn't unusual for pain clinic patients to travel hundreds of miles to obtain treatment and medications because so few doctors work in pain management.
Dr. Robert Marshall of Lafayette, La., took the stand Tuesday in federal court in Lexington as the defense began presenting witnesses in the case of 46-year-old Michael Leman and a pair of his businesses, Urgent Care Services of Philadelphia and Urgent Care Services of Cincinnati.
The indictment alleges that Leman conspired with two doctors and others to distribute methadone and oxycodone to people in eastern Kentucky from 2004 through 2008.
Marshall also said a patient's background wasn't fully checked out and, for a while, no effort was made to see if the patient had been barred from another clinic.