Caught in NJ Trying to Fill a Fake, Forged or Stolen Prescription?
If you find yourself arrested or otherwise charged with a criminal offense because you attempted to fill a bogus prescription form, blank or tablet, you certainly are not alone. As the managing partner of a major New Jersey criminal defense firm, I can tell you that this may just be the most rapidly growing area of drug offense. Cases like these arise in a variety of settings including altered or altering a prescription (e.g. increasing the quantity of medication), forgery, forged or forging a prescription blank, calling in a fake medication order, or stealing prescription blanks. Whether it is an opiate based drug such as oxycodone, percocet, valium, roxicontin, or oxycontin, or some other prescription medication, prescription forgery, fraud, possession and theft is becoming more and more prevalent.
Charges or even an indictment for this type of conduct can be multi-layered. The reason for this is the fact that a white collar case involving prescription fraud can trigger implication of various laws and related penalties. For example, N.J.S.A. 2C: 21-1 sets forth the offense of prescription forgery, N.J.S.A. 2C:35-13 concerns prescription drug fraud, N.J.S.A. 2C:20-3 is the NJ law for theft by deception, and N.J.S.A. 2C:35-10.5 concerns illegal possession of prescription drugs. All four(4) statutes often come into play when someone is arrested for this variety of drug offense. While the applicability of so many potential violations can be somewhat overwhelming to a person charged in this setting, the good news is that these types of cases are often extremely defensible for lawyers possessing experience in these cases like our law firm.
