Miami school workers charged in drug case

MIAMI, Aug. 4 (UPI) -- More than 20 Miami school employees have been charged with participating in a scheme to obtain OxyContin through false prescriptions.

A federal indictment released Thursday named 29 people as conspirators. They included a doctor, five Miami-Dade County school bus drivers, 13 school bus attendants, two school custodians, a school cook, a school cashier, a former school bus driver now working as a mass transit driver and five others.

Federal prosecutors say beginning in January 2003 three of the defendants recruited others to provide insurance information, obtain medically unnecessary prescriptions and in some cases to forge prescriptions. OxyContin -- a painkiller nicknamed "Hillbilly Heroin" -- and oxycodone were sold on the street.

U.S. Attorney Alexander Acosta said there is no evidence any of the defendants sold or gave drugs to schoolchildren. But he said drug dealing by school employees cannot be tolerated.