Nassau judge reduces murder charges against former doctor George Blatti

A judge on Thursday reduced five counts of murder against a now-former Rockville Centre physician whom Nassau prosecutors dubbed a “serial killer” to manslaughter charges.

Prosecutors have alleged George Blatti caused the deaths of five drug-addicted patients by prescribing them deadly amounts of opioids and other medications.

The Nassau District Attorney’s Office also said at the time of his 2021 murder indictment that Blatti’s case was believed to be the first time in New York that a doctor was facing second-degree murder charges under the theory of a defendant acting with depraved indifference to human life.

Acting state Supreme Court Justice Francis Ricigliano rejected that theory in his new decision, which he announced while Blatti appeared in a Mineola court with his attorney, Nancy Bartling.

“Taken in the light most favorable to the People, these allegations support a charge of reckless homicide,” the judge’s ruling said. “ . . . Reckless homicide cannot be elevated into depraved indifference murder merely because the actions of the defendant created a risk of death, however grave or substantial that risk may have been.”

Next week, Ricigliano will hear arguments about whether Blatti, now 76 and suffering from multiple medical ailments, should be released from jail while awaiting trial.

He has pleaded not guilty to the dozens of criminal counts against him, which also include charges of criminal sale of a prescription for a controlled substance and reckless endangerment.

“It’s significant because the judge found that our position was correct, that there was never depraved indifference in this matter. And as a result, the murder charges will not stand,” Bartling told Newsday after Thursday’s court proceeding. “So what that means for the case is we’ll be able to make a bail application now and most likely he’ll be released from jail.”

Prosecutors had argued that the law applies differently to doctors than to street-level drug dealers, according to Ricigliano’s decision.

They said depraved indifference murder charges could be leveled against doctors and not street dealers because doctors are subject to a heightened legal standard and have specialized knowledge that makes the likelihood of an overdose more foreseeable.

The judge wasn’t persuaded.

“A street drug dealer is certainly aware that heroin and fentanyl are deadly, just as a doctor who recklessly over-prescribes opiates is aware that an overdose can likely occur,” Ricigliano wrote, while saying the standard for depraved indifference murder “is not foreseeability.”

Blatti for a time operated his practice from a makeshift office in a former RadioShack in Franklin Square that still had store signage, and later from the parking lot of the Rockville Centre hotel where he was living or outside a nearby Dunkin’, according to authorities.

Prosecutors have said Blatti got warnings about his prescription practices from insurance companies, pharmacists, state agencies, family members of patients and even patients themselves who pleaded with him to cut them off. They have alleged he provided “shocking” quantities of opioids that served no medical purpose — often without an examination — and even to individuals he never met.

The deaths of Blatti’s five patients happened between 2016 and 2018. Authorities identified them as: Geraldine Sabatasso, 50; Michael Kinzer, 44; Robert Mielinis, 55; Sean Quigley, 31; and Diane Woodring, 53.

Nassau District Attorney’s Office spokeswoman Nicole Turso said Thursday that prosecutors are reviewing the judge’s decision.