Chin Facing Inquiry Over Hidden Assets

By Walter F. Roche Jr.

With just weeks to go before he begins serving an eight year prison sentence, the former pharmacist for the company blamed for a deadly outbreak,  is facing an inquiry into whether he misrepresented his assets to qualify for free legal representation.
The inquiry of Glenn A. Chin by a magistrate judge was disclosed in an 18-page ruling by the same judge who ruled that he must serve an eight year sentence following his conviction on racketeering and mail fraud charges.
U.S. District Judge Richard G. Stearns sitting in Boston, Mass. said the magistrate judge was examining whether Chin "may have misrepresented his net worth to avoid contributing to the payment for the services of the lawyers appointed by the court to represent him."
Stearns said the concerns arose following the disclosure that Chin and his wife Kathy, a codefendant in the case spent nearly $700,000 over the past 16 months for items including the purchase of a new car, paying off a mortgage and investing in new businesses.
In seeking a forfeiture of more than $600,000 federal prosecutors had charged that Chin failed to disclose some $700,000 held in a retirement account.
The references to the spending came in a ruling in which Stearns imposed a $175,000 forfeiture order against Chin, who was a supervising pharmacist at the now defunct New England Compounding Center, the company blamed for the 2012 fungal meningitis outbreak. Some 778 patients were sickened and 76 died from fungus laden steroids shipped from NECC.
In the same ruling Stearns acknowledged that the victims of the outbreak were unlikely to feel any sympathy for Chin.
"It is unlikely that many, if any of these victims will have any sympathy for Mr. Chin's circumstances," Stearns wrote.
Nonetheless the judge acknowledged his concern that Chin had lost his pharmacist's license and that his two children would still be minors when he is released from prison. He said that was a factor in limiting the forfeiture order to $175,000.
Chin is due to report to the federal Bureau of Prisons on March 14.
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