Former Yale Doc Gets 30 Days Prison For Illegally Prescribing Oxy

NEW HAVEN, CT — Former Yale New Haven Health emergency room resident physician was sentenced to serve 30 days in prison for writing illegal prescriptions for oxycodone, the U.S. Attorney announced Wednesday.

Jennifer Farrell, 38, of Chapel Hill, NC, was sentenced to also serve three years of supervised release once released from prison and must perform 600 hours of community service, federal prosecutors said.

According to court documents and statements made in court, Farrell was a medical resident at Yale New Haven Health in its Emergency Department from July 2017 until June 2019, according to Leonard C. Boyle, Acting U.S. Attorney for the District of Connecticut. In a news release it's noted that from March 2018 to March 2019, Farrell "wrote more than 50 prescriptions for oxycodone for non-legitimate medical purposes outside the scope of her professional practice in the name of at least five individuals."

Federal prosecutors said that she didn't "see any of the other individuals for any medical purpose at any YNHH facility during the entire period of her residency." In total, she wrote illegal prescriptions for nearly 4,000 oxycodone tablets during that approximately one-year period, Boyle's release reads.

Farrell was arrested on July 31, 2019 and in March of this year, she pleaded guilty to distribution of controlled substances outside the scope of her professional practice and without a legitimate medical purpose, the US Attorney said.

This investigation was conducted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Drug Enforcement Administration, Diversion Control Group. The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Heather Cherry.