A Rossville woman convicted of running a “pill mill” from two Chattanooga pain clinics she operated was sentenced Thursday to the absolute maximum: 280 years in federal prison.
Barbara Lang, aka “Aunt Bea,” was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Curtis Collier. A jury found Lang, 61, guilty on 21 counts after a 25-day trial in January. Those included two counts of conspiring to distribute and dispense Schedule II and IV controlled substances, outside the scope of professional practice and not for a legitimate medical purpose; five counts of maintaining a premises for the purpose of distributing controlled substances; and 14 counts of structuring financial transactions to evade reporting requirements, according to a news release from U.S. Attorney Bill Killian.
Lang’s attorney, Bryan Hoss, of the Davis and Hoss firm, said Friday his client will appeal both her conviction and the sentence, which he called “one of the most severe sentences doled out in federal court that I’ve seen in the last 15 years, to a 61-year-old grandmother with no criminal record.”
Three other people have pleaded guilty in the case. Lang’s daughter, Faith Blake, will be sentenced Oct. 1. She pleaded guilty to illegally distributing drugs through the Superior One medical clinic she operated with her mother as well as another clinic, Elite Care, she operated. She also pleaded guilty to obstructing the Internal Revenue Service and to failure to appear in court.
Dr. Jerome Sherard, Superior One’s medical director, was sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty to distributing drugs through Superior One and his own Sherard Clinic. Sherard was also ordered to forfeit $192,956.31 to the United States, according to Killian’s release.