Tri-Cities clinic owner ordered not to practice medicine after faking medical drug trials
The Washington state Department of Health has ordered the owner of two former Tri-Cities medical research companies not to practice medicine in the state.
Sami Anwar, 43, is serving a 28-year sentence in federal prison after faking Tri-Cities medical drug trials.
He has been jailed since November 2018 when a federal grand jury returned indictments that led to his conviction on 47 felony counts of conspiracy, wire fraud, mail fraud, fraudulently obtaining controlled substances and furnishing materially false information to the Drug Enforcement Administration.
In July 2019 the Washington Department of Health’s Unlicensed Practice Program notified Anwar of its intent to issue a cease-and-desist order because he had no physician’s license.
As chief executive officer of a medical center he had interfered with clinical care, reviewed patient charts and instructed a physician assistant how to treat patients.
The final order announced this month wraps up the Department of Health case and includes a $1,000 fine, which pales in comparison to the criminal sanctions in federal court.
His federal court sentence included an order to pay $1.9 million in restitution to fraud victims, and federal officials have attempted to recover $5.6 million from his assets.
Anwar operated Mid-Columbia Research and Zain Research off North Columbia Boulevard in Richland.
He trained as a medical doctor in his native Pakistan before moving to the United States in 2008. A naturalized citizen, he was unable to get his license in America so he turned to medical research.
For six years he collected millions of dollars from pharmaceutical companies and sponsors while claiming to be testing medicine for various studies.
Instead, he dumped some medications and told his employees to falsify records.
When study participants were actually given the experimental drugs, he kept incomplete records on the drugs’ safety and efficacy and also did not accurately report what was happening with the patients.
In one case a 3-year-old girl was left permanently scarred after she was enrolled in a studies for scabies medication, when she actually had eczema.
In another case, a man died while serving as a test subject in two different clinical trials at the same time.
But Anwar’s actions posed a threat to millions more, according to court documents.
Federal prosecutors said his actions placed “millions of citizens in real danger through his intentional submission of fraudulent and corrupt medical data into a public health system that Americans rely on every day.”