Doctor Who Lives In Highland Heights Admits To Doctor Shopping, Scamming Drugs From Pharmacy

A doctor who was accused of scamming pain killers from a pharmacy in Mentor has pleaded guilty to three counts of deception to obtain a dangerous drug and one county of illegal processing of drug documents.

John Brownlee, 46, of Highland Heights, is scheduled to be sentenced on June 5 by Lake County Court of Common Pleas Judge Joseph Gibson.

He could receive any punishment from community control to four years in prison. He could also be ordered to never practice medicine again.

Assistant Lake County Prosecutor Alexandra Kutz said that Brownlee visited three different doctors and asked them to prescribe him tramadol, and he didn't tell the doctors he was already receiving drugs from other physicians.

This practice is sometimes called doctor shopping.

Brownlee also admitted to calling in a tramadol prescription for a patient that wasn't his, Kutz said.

Brownlee was charged in October after an investigation by the Lake County Narcotics Agency.

He has been censured by the State Medical Board of Ohio before for his drug use, according to documents on the Ohio License Center's web site.

In 2006, the Board suspended Brownlee's medical license for 270 days. After receiving elbow surgery that year, he was prescribed Vicodin for his pain. After that prescription ran out, he started prescribing himself Percocet, using fictitious patients' names, according to a consent agreement from the Board.

Even before then, Brownlee had a history of chemical abuse, according to the Board. He previously received treatment for addiction in 1993 at the William J. Farley Institute in Virginia and again in 1994 at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation after he suffered a relapse.

After completing his suspension, Brownlee was allowed to return to medicine on a probationary status.

However, after four years, Brownlee seemed to relapse again, according to the Board.

In 2010, he asked several doctors over whom he had authority to write painkiller prescriptions for him, the Board said. Brownlee claimed the drugs were for relatives or other patients the doctors had not seen.

Brownlee has not worked at a hospital since January 2011, according to the Ohio License Center web site.

When he was charged in October 2012, he was working in a laser hair-removal center spa in Mentor.

Earlier this month, the Tenth Appellate District Court of Appeals upheld a decision by the Ohio State Medical Board that permanently revoked Brownlee's license to practice medicine or surgery in Ohio.