Statutory Committee

Pharmacist struck off Register for using forged document to support pharmacy contract application

Striking-off for pharmacist who made false claims for locum work

Striking-off for false accounting, deception and misconduct

Pharmacist struck off Register for using forged document to support pharmacy contract application

A West Midlands pharmacist who used a forged document to support an application to obtain an NHS pharmacy contract has had his name removed from Register of Pharmaceutical Chemists on the order of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society’s Disciplinary Committee.

At an inquiry held on 13 July 2007, the committee considered information that on 11 November 2004, at Dudley Magistrates’ Court, Mazair Iqbal (registration number 85616), of Walsall, had been convicted of two offences under the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act 1981, for which he had been fined a total of £6,000 and ordered to pay £400 prosecution costs. The offences were (1) making and (2) using “a false instrument, namely a document purporting to be an official copy of the Land Registry entry for 86 High Street, Pensnett, Dudley, with the intention of inducing the Secretary of State for Health to accept it as genuine and by reason of so accepting it, to do or not to do some act of his own or any other person’s prejudice”.

The committee heard that before it was falsified by Mr Iqbal the official copy showed the proprietors of the premises concerned as a Mr and Mrs Sharma. Mr Iqbal falsified the document by substituting his own name for that of Mr Sharma. His purpose in doing so was to enable him to be considered by the primary care trust for inclusion in the pharmaceutical list for Pensnett, which was a few miles from his pharmacy in Dudley. The opportunity for a new pharmacy with an NHS contract in Pensnett had arisen following the closure of a pharmacy in the area. Entry on the pharmaceutical list would have enabled Mr Iqbal to open a pharmacy there.

In support of his application, submitted in September 2002, Mr Iqbal wrote that he had secured premises in High Street, Pensnett, with full planning permission for use as a pharmacy. When details were requested he confirmed the address as 86 High Street. He had in fact no interest in those premises, which at all material times belonged to Mr and Mrs Sharma.

Contract granted

In March 2003, the PCT decided to grant the contract to another applicant, a Mr Ramzan, and Mr Iqbal appealed against the decision. In advance of the appeal hearing in August 2003, the PCT received from Mr Iqbal a faxed copy of the falsified Land Registry document and at the hearing received oral representation from him about his purported ownership of High Street premises. He claimed that the property had originally been purchased by Mrs Sharma and that he had taken a 50 per cent share in it in July 2003.

In September 2003, on the recommendation of the PCT, the Pharmacy Appeals Committee allowed Mr Iqbal’s appeal. However, as a result of an intervention by Mr Ramzan, doubts arose about the authenticity of Mr Iqbal’s Land Registry document. When interviewed under caution in April 2004, he admitted submitting a false Land Registry document because he was angry that Mr Ramzan had only wanted to acquire the contract to make money by selling it on. He maintained that he had had a verbal agreement with Mr Sharma to buy the premises if he obtained the pharmacy contract.

Mr Iqbal said in interview that he could only describe his action as stupid. He had not been thinking straight. Once he had been granted the contract he realised his mistake and did not contact Mr Sharma again.

Giving evidence before the committee, Mr Iqbal accepted that he had acted dishonestly. He said he had put in a lot of work and was not prepared to see it frustrated by someone whose only intention was to sell the contract on.

Delivering the committee’s determination, the chairman, Judge Mota Singh, said that the Society’s Code of Ethics and Standards required all pharmacists to behave with integrity and probity, to adhere to accepted standards of personal and professional conduct and not to engage in any behaviour or activity likely to bring the profession into disrepute or undermine public confidence in the profession. Dishonesty was at the most serious end of the spectrum of misconduct.

The chairman said that the committee found the allegations proved. Mr Iqbal’s conduct was deliberate and premeditated, and he had embarked on it with the intention of deceiving the appeals committee. Balanced against that was his previous unblemished character and unblemished record.

What Mr Iqbal did was totally out of character, but the committee had a public duty in such matters. The offences were so serious as to undermine confidence in the profession if his name remained on the Register. And his behaviour showed a clear lack of insight, which also made him unfit to remain on the Register. The committee therefore directed the removal of his name.

Mr Iqbal was advised that he had three months in which to exercise his right of appeal. His name was removed from the Register on 16 October 2007.

Striking-off for pharmacist who made false claims for locum work

A Wirral pharmacist who falsely claimed locum payments from his employer has had his name removed from the Register of Pharmaceutical Chemists on the order of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society’s Statutory Committee.

At an inquiry held on 23 July 2007, the committee inquired into the case of Ian Anthony McAsey (registration number 85173). Information had been received that, while employed by Moss Pharmacy Ltd as an area development manager, Mr McAsey had at the end of 2003 entered himself as a locum pharmacist on the company’s computerised database, which was not normal practice for someone in his position. He had used the name “IAM Locums”, had given details of his son’s bank account for payment, and had claimed a standard payment rate of £25 an hour, although the company usually paid £19.25 an hour to area development managers who provided locum cover as pharmacists.

The committee heard that Mr McAsey had recorded at least 33 occasions on which he had worked as a pharmacist in Moss Pharmacy branches. In an entry for 8 May 2004 he had authorised the payment of £212 (8.5 hours at £25 an hour) into his son’s bank account and had then transferred the money into his own bank account. He had also separately claimed for the same work as overtime in his role as area development manager, thereby receiving a further payment. Similarly, in entries for 3, 10 and 17 July 2004 he had authorised and subsequently received payment of £336 through his son’s bank account and again had also claimed for the same work as overtime.

Mr McAsey told the committee that on 31 December 2003 he was asked by a colleague outside his area to provide cover in mid-Wales. This enraged him and provoked him into entering his own name into the database with details of his son’s bank account. He claimed that he had made the entries to draw his employer’s attention to what he regarded an unacceptable working hours. Most of the 33 entries were designated as “hold” or “unapproved”. On the four occasions when invoices were raised he had hit the wrong computer key by mistake.

Giving the committee’s determination, the chairman, Lord Fraser of Carmyllie, QC, said that it was not alleged that Mr McAsey had done anything criminal and no court proceedings had been raised against him. He would not have been the first person to attempt to draw his employer’s attention to his unacceptable working hours. However, by recording the work against IAM Locums, far from revealing the hours he was working, he was concealing them. And so far as the payments to IAM Locums were concerned, the committee did not find it credible that he could have hit the wrong button on the computer on no fewer than four occasions. The chairman said that the Society had described Mr McAsey’s conduct as “dishonest” and his own legal representative had admitted that it was “dodgy” from the point of view of the objective onlooker. It was clear that he had resorted to a technique that he had specifically been told not to use.

Accordingly, the committee found that there had been such misconduct as to render Mr McAsey unfit to be on the Register. The dishonesty was not to be regarded as trivial or unintended. The committee had considered evidence and references on Mr McAsey’s behalf, but had to conclude that it could not condone such dishonesty in any form. It therefore directed the removal of Mr McAsey’s name from the Register.

Mr McAsey was advised that he had three months in which to exercise his right of appeal. His name was removed from the Register on 23 October 2007.

Striking-off for false accounting, deception and misconduct

Convictions for false accounting and deception and a finding of misconduct in the running of his pharmacy have led to the removal of a Leeds pharmacist’s name from the Register of Pharmaceutical Chemists.

At an inquiry held on 24 July 2007, the Statutory Committee of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society inquired into the case of Mohammed Shabir (registration number 87816). Information had been received that on 14 July 2005, at Leeds Crown Court, Mr Shabir had been convicted under the Theft Act 1968 of seven counts of false accounting and six counts of obtaining a money transfer by deception. He had been sentenced to nine months’ imprisonment, to run concurrently on each account. In addition a confiscation order had been made against him at the same court on 9 January 2006 in the sum of £212,464.17, in default of which he was to serve a further term of two years’ imprisonment.

The committee also inquired into a complaint by the Council of the Society alleging that, at the Cardigan Road Pharmacy in Leeds, Mr Shabir had dispensed, or caused to be dispensed, medicines that had been returned unused from a care home and had specifically instructed his dispenser to reuse such returned medicines. As a consequence of a visit by Society inspectors to Mr Shabir’s pharmacy, the Council had further alleged that he had failed to ensure that Controlled Drugs were kept in a locked cabinet, safe or room, that medicines supplied to patients were of adequate safety and quality, that returned medicines were not supplied to patients, that pharmaceutical waste was segregated from pharmacy stock, that batch and expiry details were include on all stocks of medicines and that pharmaceutical waste was promptly transferred to disposal containers.

The Council claimed that, individually or cumulatively, these allegations demonstrated misconduct such as to render Mr Shabir unfit to remain on the Register.

Serious consequences

The committee heard that the Theft Act convictions were for defrauding the NHS of a total of £464. Over a nine-month period Mr Shabir had charged patients for their prescriptions then claimed the money back from the NHS saying the patients were exempt. The judge had said: “The sum of money is not so large, but the consequences will be serious in other regards. Professional men and women are trusted to account for their expenditure on the basis of absolute faith.”

The committee also heard that before Mr Shabir purchased the Cardigan Road Pharmacy in May 2003 it had regularly supplied medicines for residents of four homes, which frequently returned medicines that were no longer required. The staff member responsible for preparing medicines for the homes had also had a responsibility to put any returned medicines into a disposal container. But when Mr Shabir took over the pharmacy he put returned medicines back on the stock shelves and instructed her to reuse them. When Society inspectors visited the pharmacy in March 2004 they discovered evidence of this practice, as well as the other items of concern set out in the Council’s complaint.

Giving the committee’s determination, the chairman, Lord Fraser of Carmyllie, QC, said that, having heard the evidence in support of the Council’s complaint, the committee found the relevant facts established and concluded that it was misconduct such as to render Mr Shabir unfit to be on the Register.

Turning to the Crown Court convictions, the chairman noted that Mr Shabir had appeals pending on four of the 13 counts and the committee would therefore proceed only on the basis of the other nine convictions. In imposing a sentence of nine months on each account the judge had taken into account the fact that Mr Shabir would “in all probability be struck off from the Register of pharmacists”. At an earlier stage in his sentencing remarks he had said: “I take the view that when a professional man abuses the trust placed in him to account honestly to the fund holders of a public fund, it is a breach of trust of a very serious kind.”

The chairman said that, taking the admitted convictions together with the misconduct, the committee had no option other than to direct Mr Shabir’s removal from the Register.

Mr Shabir was advised that he had three months in which to exercise his right of appeal. His name was removed from the Register on 25 October 2007.