By Walter F. Roche Jr.
A Massachusetts licensing board will be opening complaint investigations this week against the two remaining pharmacists who were indicted and convicted as a result of a federal probe of the 2012 fungal meningitis outbreak.
The action against Kathy Chin and Michele Robinson is being taken by the Massachusetts Board of Pharmacy which is scheduled to meet on Thursday.
The two were employed by the New England Compounding Center the company blamed for the outbreak.
Although neither of the two were involved with making the drugs that killed dozens of patients, they were convicted of violations of the federal Food Drug and Cosmetic Act when they approved for shipment drugs prescribed for obviously fake named patients.
Chin was convicted of four counts of violating the federal statute, while Robinson was convicted on two counts. Chin was recently sentenced to two years of probation while Robinson got a one year probation sentence. Jurors also found that the two committed the violations with intent to defraud or deceive,
The state licensing board already has initiated complaints against three other NECC defendants, Gene Svirskiy, Christopher Leary and Alla Stepanets. Those complaints remain under investigation
A complaint against another NECC employee, Sharon Carter, was dismissed because she was cleared on appeal of the federal criminal charges by U.S.District Judge Richard G. Stearns.
Svirskiy is currently serving a 30 month sentence at the federal prison in Ayer, Mass. Leary was sentenced to two years of probation with the first eight months under house arrest.
Chin's spouse, Glenn Chin, is already serving an eight year federal prison sentence and Barry Cadden, NECC's president and part owner is serving a nine year sentence. They were convicted on racketeering, conspiracy and mail fraud charges. They surrendered their state pharmacy licenses.
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