DAYTON — — Dr. Richard Sievers II started what later became a large drug-trafficking ring when a patient approached him about writing bogus prescriptions in February 2007, according to authorities with the Warren County Drug Task Force.

Sievers, 53, of 301 Orchard Drive, Oakwood, allegedly agreed to write prescriptions for a mixture of anti-anxiety pills and addictive painkillers called a "360 cocktail," according to an FBI affidavit filed in U.S. District Court.

The patient said Sievers would be paid $200 for each bogus prescription, according to the FBI. The prescription was filled at a local pharmacy and delivered to alleged drug dealer Lance E. Horn, 40, of Franklin, authorities said.

It is unclear why Sievers agreed to write the prescriptions. His attorney, Scott Calaway, declined to comment.

Friends and neighbors describe Sievers as unpretentious and well-known in his neighborhood. He has twin sons from a previous marriage and lives in a modest Spanish-style stucco house. An avid runner and skier, Sievers often watched Monday Night Football with a neighbor.

Sievers opened his own practice, Walnut Hills Family Practice, in a small building at 1900 Wayne Ave., Dayton, in January 2007. He hired Sherry Marshall to be his office manager and her husband, Kenneth Marshall, to do odd jobs around the office.

Neighbors and friends said Sievers knew the Marshalls and trusted them.

By February 2007, Sievers and the Marshalls used his office to supply prescription drugs to area drug dealers, authorities said.

At first, Sievers personally saw the patients, wrote bogus prescriptions, took $200 and walked out of the room, according to the FBI.

Word of Sievers' willingness to write the bogus prescriptions spread to a handful of alleged drug dealers, including Horn. Almost immediately more people started showing up at his office wanting more pills, said John Burke, commander of the Warren County task force.

Horn suddenly emerged as the top prescription drug dealer in Warren County, according to the FBI.

As the patient list grew, FBI informants said Sievers distanced himself by enlisting Sherry Marshall to handle the overall operation of issuing the bogus prescriptions. She was paid $100 of the $200 for her services, according to the FBI.

Kenneth Marshall became the muscle, Burke said.

"Someone had to handle all the people that started showing up at his office," Burke said. "Some of them would act out if they didn't get their pills fast enough."

The operation grew so rapidly that by March 2007, pharmacies in Montgomery County were calling Sievers' office, questioning the prescriptions for the addictive painkillers not normally prescribed by a family doctor.

"The pharmacies in the county couldn't fill all the prescriptions," Burke said.

The pharmacies also alerted local law-enforcement agencies.

Undercover agents

By October 2007, Sievers' staff couldn't keep track of all the bogus patient records in his office, according to the FBI. Local pharmacies were calling daily to question the prescriptions.

"He had at least 200 patients that were involved in the conspiracy," Burke said.

One of those patients was an undercover agent. The FBI also had several informants who received bogus prescriptions by Sievers.

On Oct. 23, 2007, an informant escorted an undercover FBI agent wired with a listening device into Sievers' office, according to the affidavit. The agent had eight fake IDs of undercover agents and wanted prescriptions for "360 cocktails."

The agent filled out bogus patient information forms with the IDs and was called back to a patient room by Kenneth Marshall. Sievers would be in shortly, Marshall told the agent.

Sievers walked in, examined the agent and said the agent's "blood pressure was whack," according to the FBI.

The agent then mentioned a name familiar to Sievers and said "I just need some dones (methadone pills)."

Sievers said, "OK, we have it covered," and, in front of the agent, signed prescriptions for the pills, according to the FBI.

A few minutes later, Kenneth Marshall handed the agent four prescriptions, each for three Duragesic (Fentanyl) patches, 60 Vicodin pills, 90 Methadone pills, 120 Xanax pills and 30 Tenormin pills, according to the FBI.

The undercover agent came back the next day and picked up the rest of the prescriptions. But Sievers was spooked. He suspected he was being watched.

Sherry Marshall told the undercover agent the doctor "was acting funny," according to the affidavit. He was suspicious of one of the names the undercover agent provided and he thought the informant was a cop, Sherry Marshall told the agent.

But Sievers signed the prescriptions anyway.

On Oct. 29, 2007, the agent came back again, but this time demanded OxyContin. Sherry Marshall walked in with 12 blank prescription forms already signed by Sievers and wrote the prescriptions in front of the undercover agent, according to the FBI.

But while she wrote the prescriptions, Kenneth Marshall strip-searched the informant who brought the agent to the office for any listening devices.

Sherry Marshall said perhaps the undercover agent should be searched, too.

The agent bluffed and said that would be OK, but Sherry Marshall declined to do the search, according to the FBI.

By then the FBI had what it needed to get a search warrant for Sievers' home and office, along with Sherry and Kenneth Marshall's home at 7607 Harshmanville Road in Huber Heights.

A week later, on Nov. 6, 2007, federal agents raided the three buildings.

'Waiting for the

Sievers' actions after the November 2007 raid suggest he knew what was coming.

In December he informed the State Medical Board of Ohio what had happened. He then stopped practicing medicine and forfeited his medical license. On Feb. 13, 2008, the State Medical Board of Ohio revoked his medical license indefinitely.

Kenneth and Sherry Marshall were arrested around that time, along with about a dozen others, including Lance Horn, Burke said. Authorities found $139,000 in cash, firearms and more than 200 tablets of OxyContin at the home of Horn's sister, Penny Jo Smith.

In a statement of facts filed in federal court Oct. 23, Kenneth Marshall admitted he and his wife were directly involved in the drug ring. He said Sievers personally prescribed him 3,500 doses of illegal prescriptions.

On Oct. 31, Sievers was stripping wallpaper from his mother's bathroom walls when federal authorities came for him. Friends said Sievers had been expecting them, but he didn't know when.

"He was waiting for the other shoe to drop," said Dr. Glenn Leslie, a friend of Sievers' since 1977. "I talked to him after he was released (without bail on Nov. 4) and he said jail was a pretty eye-opening experience."

Authorities estimate that Sievers was paid thousands of dollars to illegally prescribe "hundreds of thousands dosage units" of medication valued at $5 million.

Leslie and neighbors said Sievers told them he was taken advantage of by the Marshalls and that he never intended to be a part of a drug-trafficking ring.

"All he wants to do is root for the Cincinnati Reds and hang out with his (twin boys)," Leslie said. "This is not him."

Authorities have yet to find the money they believe Sievers received to issue the prescriptions.

On Nov. 5, the day after he was released from custody without bail, a bank foreclosed on Sievers' office building at 1900 Wayne Ave., valued at $95,000 by the Montgomery County Auditor's Office.

Eighteen people have been charged in federal court for their alleged involvement in the ring. Kenneth Marshall was the first to plead guilty to conspiracy to distribute charges. He is awaiting sentencing.

What is a '360 cocktail'

Is a slang term for a prescription that consists of anti-anxiety and addictive painkillers whose prescribed amount of pills add up to 360. These were the prescriptions issued by Dr. Richard Sievers II to more than 200 patients within a 10-month period, according to authorities.