OKLAHOMA CITY – Attorney General Mike Hunter today announced a Midwest City doctor who was charged with five counts of second-degree murder has been bound over to stand trial.
Last June, Attorney General Hunter charged Dr. Regan Nichols with five counts of second-degree murder for the deaths of at least five of her patients while she was working as an osteopathic physician at a Midwest City clinic.
During the preliminary hearing, Judge Mark McCormick heard from seven witnesses, including agents with the Drug Enforcement Administration, Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics and Medical Examiner’s Office before ruling that there was probable cause the defendant committed the crime of second-degree murder.
Attorney General Hunter thanked the witnesses, attorneys and agents who appeared during the preliminary hearing and for presenting the evidence.
“A doctor who prescribes patients with thousands of addictive and dangerous opioids outside of a legitimate medical need is a drug dealer,” Attorney General Hunter said. “We are going to hold doctors, like Nichols, accountable for abusing their prescribing authority and the consequent deaths of their patients. We are confident in our case and will bring justice to the loved ones of the victims who lost their lives due to Nichols’ reckless prescribing.”
According to the probable cause affidavit, Nichols prescribed controlled dangerous substances to patients without a legitimate medical need, in quantities and circumstances that are considered an extreme disregard for human life.
Investigators found the five individuals who died were prescribed more than 1,800 opioid pills in the same months as their deaths.
A pretrial conference has been set for Sept. 9 before Oklahoma County District Judge Bill Graves.
For more on this case, click here: https://bit.ly/2IvPZoD.