Prosecutor: McHenry Co. doc traded painkiller prescriptions for cash

A doctor dispensed with all pretenses of proper medical care and simply traded painkiller prescriptions for cash out of a ramshackle office in northern McHenry County, a prosecutor said Tuesday during opening statements in the physician's drug trial.

Dr. Thanam L. Paramanandhan, 75, of Spring Grove, faces six counts of unlawful delivery of a controlled substance alleging she illegally wrote prescriptions in 2006 and 2007 to a police informant and an undercover McHenry County Sheriff's deputy who came to her office complaining of back pain. Her medical license was suspended after the allegations surfaced in May 2007; she could face two to five years in prison if found guilty.

Assistant McHenry County State's Attorney Michael Combs told jurors Paramanandhan sold the undercover officer a prescription for Vicodin after she came to her Richmond office Dec. 22, 2006, and said her back hurt. She received a refill about two weeks later, charges allege.

"It was $55 for the drug of your choice just by complaining of pain," Combs said. "No examination was given. This was simply a cash transaction that no legitimate doctor would have conducted."

Paramanandhan's medical office, Combs added, was in such a state of disrepair that it would have been impossible to give a legitimate examination even if she wanted.

The officer was brought to Paramanandhan by an informant who, Combs said, also obtained prescriptions for Vicodin and Valium in the name of his son. The informant's son was in a Wisconsin jail at the time.

Paramanandhan's attorney, Daniel Hofmann, did not dispute that she issued the prescriptions, but argued that she was misled by the informant and police officer. The informant's son for whom she issued prescriptions, Hofmann noted, had been receiving treatment from her for injuries sustained before his incarceration in Wisconsin.

And, he added, when the undercover officer came to her office a third time looking for more Vicodin, Paramanandhan refused, telling her to exercise or change her diet if her pain would not go away.

Jurors heard from the undercover officer who bought Vicodin from Paramanandhan as well as a secretly recorded audiotape of their conversation. The trial is expected to last until early next week.