Doctor charged in steroids case pleads not guilty

April 4, 2007

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) _ A former New York doctor accused of writing illegal prescriptions for human growth hormone and anabolic steroids pleaded not guilty Wednesday in her first court appearance in Rhode Island.

Ana Maria Santi faces 29 federal counts of conspiracy, illegal drug distribution and health care fraud.

Prosecutors in February charged Santi and another doctor with writing prescriptions for customers of American Pharmaceutical Group without having met or examined them. They also say Santi, who had her medical license revoked in 1999, forged the signature of another doctor to write the prescriptions.

Edward Roy, an assistant federal public defender and Santi's court-appointed attorney, said he hoped to resolve the case through a plea deal before his client is sentenced next month in New York in a state case that he said involved similar allegations.

The president of New Jersey-based American Pharmaceutical Group, Daniel McGlone, has pleaded not guilty. He is charged with advertising steroids and human growth hormone to bodybuilders and other customers and then paying Santi and another doctor, Victor Mariani, to write medically unnecessary prescriptions.