A retired Starkville doctor was sentenced Tuesday to three years of probation and ordered to forfeit more than $105,000 after pleading guilty in federal court to receiving and distributing misbranded pharmaceutical drugs.
Dr. Benjamin Franklin Sanford, Jr., 69, must also pay a fine of $95,000 and $377,545.20 in restitution.
Sanford has been convicted in the Northern District of Mississippi Court in Oxford for “receiving misbranded drugs in interstate commerce and distributing them with the intent to defraud his patients,” according to a Department of Justice press release.
Between April 2013 and June 2018, Sanford obtained foreign versions of prescription drugs that had not been approved by the Food and Drug Administration, the release says. The drugs, including versions of Prolia, Boniva and Aclasta, were shipped to Sanford’s clinic from overseas and administered to patients without their knowledge.
At the time, Sanford worked for Starkville Internal Medicine on Brandon Road. Federal investigators temporarily closed the clinic in July 2018 while FDA and other federal agencies investigated the clinic, The Dispatch previously reported. Sanford was not charged at that time.
Starkville Internal Medicine was obtained by OCH Regional Medical Center in August 2020 and changed its name to OCH Medical Associates, according to a text from OCH Public Information Officer Mary Kathryn Kight. She said Sanford left the clinic in January, and he is no longer listed as a practicing physician at the clinic on its website.
Sanford’s attorney, Joseph Hollomon of Jackson, said Sanford accepted responsibility for “what occurred in his office.”
“He’s relieved to have the matter resolved, and Ben has cooperated from Day 1 with the authorities to try to expedite getting the matter to conclusion,” Hollomon told The Dispatch this morning.
Sanford’s charge carried a maximum penalty of three years in prison and a $250,000 fine, according to court documents.
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