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SALT LAKE CITY — State investigators raided 27 stores in a two-day crackdown on the sale of illegally imported painkillers and other drugs that officials say could pose a public health risk.
The Utah Attorney General Secure Strike Force seized thousands of boxes of pills, capsules and injectable antibiotics, and hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash on Monday and Tuesday, said Ken Wallentine, the attorney general's law enforcement chief. Police arrested 21 people, including a man suspected of smuggling the drugs into Utah. Some of them are in the country illegally.
"It's a pretty large-scale drug distribution chain of a different color," Wallentine said.
Seized drugs include Lortab, oxycodone, penicillin, amoxicillin, steroids and "some we're still not sure what they are," he said. The Food and Drug Administration bans some of the drugs taken due to their negative side effects.
In one store that sells cowboy boots, all but one box of a particular size boot contained drugs and bundles of cash totaling $250,000.
The drugs were being sold without prescriptions out of Hispanic markets, shops and stores in Salt Lake, Utah, Davis, Weber, Summit and Tooele counties, Wallentine said. None contained pharmacies or held licenses to sell prescription medication.
"The clandestine sales of illegal pharmaceuticals is big business for some of these stores," he said.
In one store that sells cowboy boots, he said, all but one box of a particular size boot contained drugs and bundles of cash totaling $250,000. Agents also found a set of books "suggesting a huge volume in backdoor drug sales," he said. Another store had $40,000 in cash hidden with the stash of pharmaceuticals.
Records police found in one store show a Mexican man who last month admitted in court to practicing dentistry without a license bought painkillers there, Wallentine said. The man, Carlos Counter, sold Lortab to patients for $2 a pill out of his Orem home office, according to court documents.
A man from Nicaragua arrested in the operation was identified as a major importer of illegal pharmaceuticals, Wallentine said. A search of a storage facility he controlled yielded nearly 1,500 containers of smuggled prescription pills.
Officials say the sale of the types of drugs taken in the raid, particularly the antibiotics, could cause serious health problems.
"Unfettered distribution of powerful antibiotics creates a very significant public health threat," Wallentine said. "Improper use of these drugs can help breed a superbug that could cause a wide scale pandemic, potentially endangering tens of thousands of persons."
The possibility of a superbug is among the concerns Dr. Marc Babitz has about people buying illicit antibiotics, which he said patients tend to overuse.
Dr. Marc Babitz fears buyers of under-the-table medications don't know what they're getting. They aren't made aware of the side effects or the consequences of mixing them with other medications.
He also fears buyers of under-the-table medications don't know what they're getting. They aren't made aware of the side effects or the consequences of mixing them with other medications.
"People just don't know what to watch for," said Babitz, director of the Division of Family Health and Preparedness at the Utah Department of Health. For example, he said, some anti-inflammatories police confiscated could cause bleeding and kidney damage.
Wallentine said authorities launched the investigation about two weeks ago after hearing rumors of illegal pharmaceuticals, including "Mexican Lortab," being sold from businesses around town.
"We were told this has been going for several years," he said.
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