FEDERAL authorities on Sunday arrested former Guyanese Health Minister Dr. Noel Blackman who has been charged in relation to illegal prescription of painkillers.He is suspected of illegally prescribing vast amounts of oxycodone, 365,000 pills in 2015, in a drug-dealing enterprise spanning three States.
According to a report carried by the New York newspaper, Newsday, agents took Blackman, 68, into custody after they ordered a Guyana-bound jet taxiing for take-off at the Kennedy Airport with Blackman aboard to return to an airport terminal.
Newsday reported that federal agents were tipped off that the Long Island, New York doctor, a Guyana native, had planned to leave the country permanently.
Blackman, who was recently appointed Chairman of the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC), is also a partner in the local television station, HBTV Channel Nine, and had served as Health Minister under the People’s National Congress administration of then President Desmond Hoyte.
According to the Newsday report, officials say US$30,000 was stashed in the Far Rockaway doctor’s luggage.
Blackman was arraigned on Monday in Central Islip on a charge of conspiracy to distribute oxycodone.
The report noted that records show he wrote 114 prescriptions in 2014 for about 3,800 oxycodone pills, and nearly 2,500 prescriptions for about 365,000 pills last year.
The Guyana Chronicle understands that efforts are being made by the Ministry of Public Health to replace Blackman.