Michelle Breitenbach Pleaded Guilty Today

So her sentencing date passed, any idea what she got?

 

she is next! New Jersey just restarted her trial.

 

Your mothers on trial for meth and too many paid blo jobs.

 

Law360, Boston (March 26, 2019, 8:38 PM EDT) -- Insys Therapeutics founder John Kapoor had a physical relationship with a sales representative who complained to him on several occasions about the structure of the company's speaker program, according to testimony by the former employee Tuesday as federal prosecutors continued their quest to prove Kapoor knew what was going on at all levels of his company.

After some prodding by Assistant U.S. Attorney David Lazarus, Susan Beisler told the Boston jury there was "one time" when her relationship with Kapoor turned physical. The details of that encounter weren't clear, but Lazarus elicited other testimony and presented documents throughout the day to suggest Beisler's cozy relationship with the pharmaceutical mogul was unusual for a low-level employee.

Beisler emailed Kapoor from her personal address and texted and called him on his personal cellphone, she said, telling Lazarus she was not aware of any other sales reps who communicated with Kapoor in those ways. On one occasion, Beisler testified, she and Kapoor went to dinner in New York — Beisler was based in New Jersey, Kapoor in Arizona — at a high-end sushi restaurant.

In the summer of 2013, Beisler emailed Kapoor multiple times to express her belief that other sales reps were allowed to allocate more speaker programs to doctors than she was, and that favoritism — namely, the friendships some reps had with vice president of sales Alec Burlakoff — was behind some of the decisions.

"Alec hires and promotes those he cares about and it's not always based on merit," Beisler wrote to Kapoor in a July 2013 email. She complained, in particular, about Michelle Breitenbach, a New Jersey sales rep who pled guilty last year to conspiracy to commit commercial bribery.

"Michelle did not do well at Insys until Alec offered her doctors unlimited speaker programs, and that's when she took off," Beisler wrote. "I, unfortunately, don't have any viable speakers in my territory. Yet I've gotten more new [prescription] writers from LESS programs than anyone in the region."

Lazarus pointed to other statements in Beisler's emails to Kapoor to suggest she was referencing the alleged bribery of doctors through Insys' speaker program.

"Nobody considers merit or experience, or the fact that [many] of our top reps' doctors are influenced by unlimited speaker honorariums," Beisler once wrote. "It all comes down to the bottom line."

In another message to Kapoor in July 2013, Beisler wrote: "Am I missing something here? My doctors adore me, everyone tells me I am amazing ... and I'm making less money than I have in 15 years, working around the clock." The problem, she wrote, was that Burlakoff made "promises to certain doctors of uncapped [speaker] fees."

The emails conveyed a mixture of frustration about not advancing within the company — though Beisler was ultimately promoted to a managerial role in 2015 — and adulation for Kapoor.

"I hope you will keep this in confidence because nobody knows I speak to you," she wrote in one email, adding: "You are the most amazing man I've met in my lifetime [38 years and counting!] ... Thanks for taking time to talk to me and many hugs and kisses."

Kapoor's wife died of breast cancer in 2005, seven years before Beisler started working for Insys. His wife's death purportedly led him to develop Insys' fentanyl spray, Subsys, as a way to help cancer patients manage their pain.

On cross-examination, lawyers for Kapoor and his four co-defendants, all former sales executives, prompted Beisler to confirm that she was not talking to Kapoor about any quid pro quo involving speaker fees and doctors' prescriptions of Subsys. Rather, Beisler said she felt doctors with more experience prescribing the drug were better suited to speak to other prescribers about its benefits.

"How can you speak intelligently about a product that you're not using?" Beisler said Tuesday.

Pete Horstmann, representing former sales executive Sunrise Lee, emphasized that Beiseler's frustration about the success of other sales reps was driving her communications with Kapoor.

"Would you agree you were suffering from a case of speaker envy?" Horstmann asked. Beisler answered affirmatively.

Unlike other witnesses, who have said Kapoor was a demanding boss who sometimes became angry when he didn't get his way, Beisler described Kapoor's demeanor with her as "funny, kind, receptive."

Read more at: Ex-Insys Rep Recounts Ties, Some Physical, To Founder - Law360

 

YUCK!

 

There must be a lot of singing.

https://www.lehighvalleylive.com/news/2019/06/local-doctor-who-lost-license-in-opioid-prescription-scam-now-faces-federal-charges-authorities-say.html

 

Nice to MB dance moves on HBO.