Money was motive for drug-dealing SC doctor now facing prison time

Dr. Mackie J. Walker of Aiken, once a respected podiatrist, pleaded guilty Wednesday in federal court to being the key figure in a major South Carolina oxycodone drug trafficking ring.

Walker, 63, who sold oxycodone prescriptions to dozens of addicts and drug traffickers for up to $1,000 per prescription, is now subject to being sent to prison for up to 20 years, prosecutors said.

“Dr. Walker preyed upon the vulnerabilities and imperfections of various individuals for his own financial benefit,” assistant U.S. Attorney Ben Garner told federal Judge Michelle Childs during Walker’s guilty plea hearing at the federal courthouse in Columbia.

In return for his guilty plea, prosecutors agreed not to charge Walker with the overdose death of a patient for whom he had prescribed oxycodone, Garner told Childs. Walker had “no legitimate medical purpose” in writing that prescription, Garner said.

It is rare for S.C. doctors to be convicted of drug trafficking offenses involving prescription opioids, which are powerful and highly addictive painkillers. For one thing, doctors have wide discretion to write such prescriptions and prosecutors must be able to show the prescription had no legitimate medical use.

In all, Walker wrote illegal prescriptions for 51,580 oxycodone pills, Garner told Childs.

Walker’s motive was to make money since “he had no cash flow and was experiencing financial difficulties” in recent years, Garner said

Since most prescriptions were for 120 pills, and each pill could sell for up to $30, a trafficker who paid Walker $1,000 per prescription could still clear a profit of $2,600 by selling all the pills. More often, traffickers would ingest some of the pills themselves and sell the rest, Garner said. Walker and others also recruited people he could sell prescriptions to, Garner said.

Childs will sentence Walker at a later, unscheduled date.

During the hearing, Walker’s lawyers – Jack Swerling and Harrison Saunders, both of Columbia – successfully argued to Childs that Walker should stay free pending his sentencing.

Although Walker is a recovering alcoholic with a serious problem, he has not touched a drop of alcohol since last September and has attended numerous Alcoholic Anonymous meetings, including more than 300 since last January, lawyers said.

“He (Walker) is a severe alcoholic,” Saunders told Childs. “That is his main issue.”

Walker has strong family ties to Aiken and a 9-year-old son with whom he reads the Bible every night, Saunders said. The lawyers also indicated they would contest the government’s assertion that Walker wrote prescriptions for 51,580 pills.

Childs ruled that Walker must wear a GPS monitor until sentencing and have his movements severely restricted.

Prosecutors said they had 12 witnesses who had gotten prescriptions from Walker and resold them on the streets ready to testify had he not pleaded guilty.

Other evidence in the case included cell phone text messages discussing illegal prescription drug transactions between Walker and a co-defendant, Garner told Childs.

During the DEA’s investigation, agents equipped a confidential source with miniaturized audio and visual recording equipment, Garner told Childs. That person pretended to be a drug trafficker and got Walker to issue a prescription after the source told Walker the pills would be sold be profit, Garner said.

Walker’s license to practice medicine was suspended last year.

Oycodone is classified as a Schedule II narcotic, meaning strict regulations govern its use. Known as Hillbilly Heroin and Roxy and Oxy, it gives uses feelings of euphoria. But overdose can cause extreme drowsiness, heart slowing, fainting and death, according to the DEA.

Across the nation, overdose deaths from prescription opioids, a narcotic family that includes oxycodone, have quadrupled since 1999, according to the federal Center for Disease Control and Prevention, which has labeled the prescription abuse an “epidemic.”

In 2014, more than 14,000 people died from overdoses involving prescription opioids. According to the CDC, 701 people in South Carolina died in 2014 from prescription overdoses, most of which involved abuse of opioids like oxycodone.

Swerling told Childs that Walker knows he won’t get probation. “He has accepted the fact that he is going to prison.”

This story was originally published August 17, 2016 at 6:39 PM with the headline "Money was motive for drug-dealing SC doctor now facing prison time."