Patricia Valera
ROLLING IN DOUGH: Dr. Hector Castro (center, in custody this week) and office assistant Patricia Valera (right) allegedly lived the good life running separate scrip-selling operations that netted hundreds of thousands of dollars, some of which (left) prosecutors say they found in Castro’s home. (
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A Gramercy Park doctor and his assistant sold thousands of oxycodone prescriptions in two separate trafficking operations that poured more than half a million pills into the hands of dealers and junkies across the Northeast, authorities charged yesterday.
Dr. Hector Castro, 51, had no clue that his office manager, Patricia Valera, 28 — who went by the nickname “Kardashian” — was selling his scrips to a massive drug ring involving dozens of dealers across New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Massachusetts, prosecutors said.
Meanwhile, Castro ran his own, parallel operation out of his Itzamna Medical Center — selling more than 5,100 prescriptions to painkiller junkies in New York and New Jersey to the tune of more than $637,000, records show.
The scheme netted Valera — who earned her Kardashian nickname because of her luxe fashion tastes — at least $356,500 between August 2009 and March 2013, law-enforcement authorities said.
She spent it on lavish vacations to Puerto Rico, casino gambling, Louis Vuitton watches and Tom Ford sunglasses, records show.
“How many people died so [Valera] could buy a Louis Vuitton bag?” said Bridget Brennan, chief of the city’s Officer of the Special Narcotics Prosecutor. “How many people became addicted?”
Officials launched a probe into the practice when a Woodbridge, NJ, man overdosed in December 2011 on oxycodone, the highly addictive painkiller, a day after filling a prescription signed by Castro.
Authorities say they soon uncovered Castro’s and Valera’s involvement with interstate drug dealings that diverted more than 500,000 pills with an estimated street value of $10 million.
Castro allegedly pumped out thousands of scrips at $125 apiece.
But the business-savvy Valera went a step beyond — she allegedly swiped hundreds of scrips from the doctor and sold them to drug dealers at the top of massive operations in Pennsylvania for $500 a pop.
“Smart businesswoman, I guess,” Brennan said.
“There’s no price control on this kind of trafficking.”
Castro — who founded Itzamna in 2001 — was arrested at his Hell’s Kitchen home Tuesday and is being held in lieu of $500,000 bond on drug-trafficking charges.
He pleaded not guilty in Manhattan Supreme Court and faces more than 200 years in prison.
Cops seized $20,000 in cash from a locked box in his house along with medical records and computer equipment.
Valera was arrested with her husband, Hector Rodriguez, Tuesday in their Bronx home, where police found a loaded handgun and about $8,000 in cash and blank scrips. She pleaded not guilty.
Three other people were arrested in New York and New Jersey, and 43 are charged in Pennsylvania— the largest drug takedown in the state’s history. Police seized 30 weapons from the criminals, records show.