MINEOLA, N.Y. (1010 WINS/ WCBS 880) – A Long Island doctor was sentenced to prison on Tuesday after over-prescribing opioids to five patients leading to their deaths, prosecutors said.
An investigation by the Nassau County Police Department’s Asset Forfeiture and Intelligence Unit into several opioid overdoses began in August 2018 and found that some individuals had an unusually high number of opioid prescriptions, all written by the same doctor, George Blatti, 78.
Between 2016 and 2018, patients who were addicted to opioids would visit Blatti and he would prescribe thousands of pills, including oxycodone, morphine, clonazepam, alprazolam, and oxycontin, without any medical history or examination, according to the indictment.
Blatti, a general practitioner licensed since 1976 with no special training in pain management, sometimes prescribed opioid painkillers to patients he had never met or spoken to.
Blatti also met customers in a temporary office set up in a former Radio Shack store in Franklin Square, Hempstead, where the old Radio Shack sign and merchandise shelves were still up on the walls, through 2019, according to the prosecutors.
After a while, Blatti lost access to that space and began meeting patients in his car, where he prescribed medications without examination in the parking lots of the Rockville Centre hotel in Lynbrook, where he lived, and a nearby Dunkin’ Donuts.
Blatti used paper prescriptions under a waiver from the New York State Health Commissioner, enabling him to bypass the state's secure electronic prescription system, which is usually mandatory, and offers increased oversight.
As a result of his prescribing practices, five individuals, Geraldine Sabatasso, 50, Michael Kinzer, 44, Robert Mielinis, 55, Sean Quigley, 31, and Diane Woodring, 53, died.
Sabatasso received treatment from Blatti for post-surgery pain starting in 2007 and over six months received 35 prescriptions for over 4,000 opioid pills. She passed away on March 22, 2016, due to acute oxycodone intoxication, according to the indictment.
“This doctor prescribed massive quantities of dangerous drugs to victims exhibiting clear signs of addiction and other health emergencies,” Nassau County District Attorney Anne T. Donnelly said. “We entrust doctors with our care every day, assuming that their medical expertise and ethical oath to do no harm will ensure our health and safety. George Blatti did not live up to his oath. He failed his patients and caused inconceivable suffering to their families.”
Kinzer began seeing Blatti in 2013 and was treated with opioids for less than six months, receiving over a thousand pills. He overdosed on Oct. 29, 2016, and died on Nov. 17, 2016, shortly after being prescribed morphine, clonazepam, alprazolam, and oxycontin by Blatti.
Mielinis was a patient of Blatti for about eight years. He received several prescriptions, including a mix of oxycodone and alprazolam, and died on Jan. 21, 2017, from mixed drug toxicity. In seven months, he had received around 49 prescriptions for thousands of these pills.
Quigley, a volunteer firefighter, struggled with opioid abuse since 2008. Despite liver failure, Blatti prescribed him 180 oxycodone pills in November 2017. Quigley died of acute intoxication from oxycodone and oxymorphone on Dec. 2, 2017.
Woodring, from Port Washington, died on Sept. 11, 2018, due to acute intoxication from a combination of medications including oxycodone and alprazolam, prescribed by Blatti.
Blatti was arrested on April 18, 2019, and pleaded guilty on Oct. 10, 2023, to five counts of manslaughter in the second degree.
He voluntarily surrendered his medical license to New York State authorities on June 24, 2019, after this investigation began.
Blatti was sentenced to five to 15 years in prison.
“As we continue to battle the opioid epidemic across communities on Long Island, we hope that George Blatti’s sentence sends a strong message: if you overprescribe opioids and endanger patients, we will hold you accountable,” Donnelly said.