Dr. Roya Jafari-Hassad, of Great Neck, illegally prescribed pain pills to patients for cash, prosecutor tells jurors 

A Great Neck doctor routinely prescribed highly addictive opioid pills without medical reason to patients in exchange for cash after performing "little to no physical examination," a prosecutor told the jury at the beginning of her trial in federal court Monday.

Dr. Roya Jafari-Hassad, 58, also fed patients false narratives to cover up the illicit transactions after federal agents searched her offices at Advanced Medical Health Services, Assistant U.S. Attorney Katherine Onyshko said during opening arguments before U.S. District Judge Gary Brown in Central Islip.

"This is a case about drug dealing, about selling dangerous, powerful narcotics for cash," Onyshko told the jury. "But this drug dealing didn't take place on the street. It took place in a doctor's office."

Jafari-Hassad was arrested in December 2022 on an 18-count grand jury indictment charging her with 15 counts of illegal distribution of oxycodone and witness tampering, court records show. The indictment was the result of an investigation into her practices from 2019 to 2022.

Prosecutors said jurors will hear testimony from an undercover DEA agent who allegedly bought hundreds of pills from Jafari-Hassad with "thousands of dollars in cash" and a patient who visited the doctor on the recommendation of his son, who Onyshko said was already being prescribed oxycodone. The prosecutor said the doctor did not ask the patient about his pain and did not conduct a physical examination or  any tests before prescribing him the narcotics.

"She did have questions about how he was going to pay," Onyshko said.

Defense attorney John J. Dowling III, of North Carolina, countered that the investigation into the doctor, who has operated on Long Island for more than 20 years, was a law enforcement operation designed to "set her up" by using an undercover officer who gave the doctor false information about his health.

Dowling, who is defending Jafari-Hassad along with Bruce Barket, of Garden City, and Ronald W. Chapman II, of Michigan, said the undercover agent told his client he was a landscaper who suffered back and shoulder injuries from a car crash and labor. The undercover operative said he had already received an X-ray and MRI confirming the injuries, which he later produced for the doctor, Dowling said.

"Doctors are taught to trust the patient," Dowling told the jury. "An undercover agent is taught to lie and gain trust. You see what type of friction that causes and how that can result in a dramatically bad situation?"

Dowling also argued prosecutors will fail to prove Jafari-Hassad engaged in witness tampering, saying his client wasn’t aware of the details of the investigation when she contacted patients following the execution of a search warrant at her office on Bond Street in 2022.

"It’s not even clear that [Jafari-Hassad] knew what a grand jury proceeding was," Dowling told the jury.

Dowling said pain management made up a "fraction" of the practice run by the doctor, who he said specializes in anti-aging.

Prosecutors said the jury will hear otherwise from patients who were prescribed oxycodone by the doctor and see "false records" the doctor allegedly created to legitimize the prescriptions, which Onyshko said she sold at $350 cash for 15 days of doses and $700 for a monthly supply.

Prosecutors said the undercover agent was not only prescribed oxycodone during each visit he made to the office, but his dosage was raised from 20 mg per day to 80 mg without him requesting the increase.

At the time of her arrest, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York referred to Jafari-Hassad’s practice as a "pill mill" that generated her "hundreds of thousands of dollars a year cash" solely on oxycodone prescriptions.

Following her arrest, Jafari-Hassad agreed to not treat patients for pain management and surrendered her license to prescribe controlled substances pending the outcome of her case, New York State Department of Health records show.

By Grant Parpan

grant.parpan@newsday.com@GrantParpan

Grant Parpan covers Suffolk County courts and federal courts for Newsday. A Long Island native, he joined Newsday in 2022.