Madera pharmacist pleads guilty to trafficking more than 200,000 opiate pills

Image of Ifeanyi Vincent Ntukogu via New Life Pharmacy website

Residents of Fresno Ifeanyi Vincent Ntukogu, 49, and Kelo White, 43, pleaded guilty Monday to conspiracy to distribute and distribute oxycodone and hydrocodone, U.S. Attorney Phillip A. Talbert announced.

According to court records, from December 2014 to November 2018, in Madera and Fresno, Ntukogu distributed more than 200,000 oxycodone and hydrocodone pills based on prescriptions issued to him by White and his co-defendant Donald Ray Pierre, 55, of Fresno, which they knew were false and fraudulent.

Ntukogu reviewed each prescription and rejected those he thought regulators might find suspicious. For example, Ntukogu rejected prescriptions written by certain doctors or written for people whose prescriptions were filled at other pharmacies. He also alerted White and Pierre when the required text on the prescription pads had changed.

Ntukogu distributed the pills through his New Life pharmacy in Madera. In doing so, he demanded cash payments from White and Pierre and increased the price he charged over time.

Ntukogu, Pierre and White were charged in April 2019.

This case is the result of an investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the California Department of Health Care Services. Assistant United States Attorneys Antonio Pataca and Joseph Barton are prosecuting the case.

Ntukogu and White are expected to be sentenced on September 23. They face statutory maximum penalties of 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine for each of the conspiracy to distribute and distribution convictions.

Pierre, the other accused in the case, had already been convicted and sentenced to nine years and four months in prison.