Former Anchorage doctor sentenced to home imprisonment for his role in opioid conspiracy, fraud
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A former Anchorage doctor was sentenced Wednesday to spend a year under home imprisonment after he admitted to prescribing unnecessary opioids to patients, in part to fuel his own addiction.
Both prosecutors and defense attorneys agreed Wednesday that now-68-year-old Michael Robertson showed genuine remorse and even relief almost immediately after the charges were filed.
From 2015 until 2018, Robertson prescribed 30 patients a total of 465 prescriptions for an opioid called meperidine, commonly sold under the brand name Demerol, according to federal plea agreement signed in July 2019. Robertson would have the patients divert the pills back to him and, in exchange, he would write them prescriptions for opioids including fentanyl and oxycodone, the plea agreement said.