Business & Tech
Brooklyn Mom-and-Pop Pharmacy Ran 'Massive' Oxycodone Ring: DEA
Chopin Chemists was behind "one of the largest illegal diversions of oxycodone pills ever uncovered in a New York State pharmacy," feds say.

Two tiny pharmacies in Brooklyn and Queens, under the umbrella name Chopin Chemists, posed as mom-and-pop shops while operating a “massive pill mill” in which they distributed $10 million to $15 million in oxycodone pills over five years, according to the federal Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) and Department of Justice (DOJ).
Marcin and Lilian Jakacki — residents of Greenwich, Conn., one of the most expensive small towns in America — owned both shops, investigators say.
Chopin Brooklyn was located in Greenpoint, but was closed down in 2013. Chopin Queens was up and running in Ridgewood until this month.
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Their owners, the Jakackis, were indicted Thursday in Manhattan federal court as the alleged masterminds behind ”a multimillion-dollar oxycodone distribution scheme that flooded New York City with illegal controlled substances,” the DEA said in a news release.
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More than half a million pills of oxycodone, an opioid painkiller, are believed to have passed through their pharmacy doors.
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Many of the pills were originally purchased off the black market ”at a deep discount from the prices legitimate suppliers typically charge,” DEA officials said — then resold at retail rate.
Federal officials are calling the Jakackis’ ring ”one of the largest illegal diversions of oxycodone pills ever uncovered in a New York State pharmacy.”
The couple’s biggest (alleged) client, Staten Island resident Robert Cybulski, has also been arrested on charges of regularly visiting Chopin Brooklyn “with multiple prescriptions in others’ names, typically obtaining 500 30-milligram oxycodone pills each time.”
Cybulski allegedly bought tens of thousands of pills in total.
Chopin Brooklyn first came on the DEA’s radar as the single largest purchaser of oxycodone pills in its zip code for three straight years, from 2010 to 2012. (The next highest purchaser was 240,000 pills behind.)
So the DEA conducted an audit of Chopin Brooklyn in 2013 — and found that more than 400,000 pills had been handed out to customers without prescriptions.
The other shoe dropped this September and October, when, according to the DEA, an undercover agent was able to purchase hundreds of oxycodone pills at Chopin Queens.
To top it all off, the Jakackis are accused of laundering the money they reaped from the scheme, then using it to buy — among other things — a $2 million mansion in Greenwich.
A full list of the charges against them is included below, courtesy of the DOJ.
- Marcin Jakacki, 49: One count of conspiracy to distribute and possess with the intent to distribute oxycodone illegally, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison; one count of conspiracy to commit health care fraud, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison; one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison; two counts of money laundering, each which carry a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison; and one count of conspiracy to misbrand prescription medication, which carries a maximum sentence of 5 years in prison.
- Lilian Jakacki, 35: One count of conspiracy to distribute and possess with the intent to distribute oxycodone illegally, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison; one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 in prison; and one count of money laundering, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.
- Robert Cybulski, 30: One count of conspiracy to distribute and possess with the intent to distribute oxycodone illegally, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.
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