Houston doctor Richard Arthur Evans, 72, is headed to federal prison for fueling a massive oxycodone pipeline that flooded Louisiana and Texas with nearly 1.6 million pills. A federal jury convicted Evans on all 19 counts July 27, 2016, after just eight hours of deliberation. Today, U.S. District Judge Kenneth Hoyt slammed him with 60 months behind bars, followed by three years of supervised release. Evans was also ordered to pay a $250,000 fine and forfeit $268,000 in assets tied to the scheme.
Evans, who surrendered his medical license, ran a cash-and-carry pain clinic operation that attracted patients from as far as Baton Rouge, Louisiana—some driving six hours just to get a prescription. He saw patients at Winrock Clinic and New Haven Clinic before directing them to his private office after those facilities shut down. There, he charged $200 to $240 in cash for initial visits, prescribing powerful narcotics like oxycodone and hydrocodone with little to no medical justification.
Refills for narcotics are illegal—but Evans bypassed the law. Patients testified they were told they could get a new prescription in 30 days without an exam, so long as they mailed a $200 to $240 money order. A third prescription? Same deal: send cash, get pills. No follow-up. No physical. No problem. Evans’ staff delivered the signed prescriptions directly to Briargrove Pharmacy, owned by co-defendant David Devido, 78, of Houston, who then shipped the drugs via U.S. mail and FedEx across state lines.
The trial exposed grotesque lapses in medical ethics. Jurors watched undercover video of Evans signing off on prescriptions written by a nurse—without ever seeing or speaking to the patient. One defense expert, a physician, admitted he was stunned that over 800 of Evans’ patients came from the Baton Rouge area. He called pre-signed prescriptions a sign of ‘poor’ medical practice—underselling a racket that fed addiction and circumvented federal drug laws.
Evans and Devido operated as a criminal tag team: Evans wrote the scripts, Devido filled them. Together, they funneled approximately 1.6 million dosage units of oxycodone—a highly addictive opioid—into the black market over just two years. On the street, each pill fetched around $40, turning desperate patients into walking cash machines. The jury reviewed more than 175 exhibits and heard 14 days of testimony from 15 witnesses, including expert doctors who confirmed the prescriptions had no legitimate medical basis.
Devido, the pharmacist who enabled the pipeline, pleaded guilty on the first day of trial and is scheduled for sentencing tomorrow. Federal prosecutors emphasized that Evans distributed narcotics ‘outside the course of professional practice and not for a legitimate medical purpose’—a legal death knell. For years, he exploited his M.D. like a license to print money. Now, he’ll spend five years behind bars, paying for the pain he helped spread.
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Key Facts
- State: Texas
- Agency: DOJ USAO
- Category: Drug Trafficking
- Source: Official Source ↗
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