Kentucky doctor admits improper drug prescribing. Police investigated after deaths.

A former family-practice doctor in Clinton County has pleaded guilty to improperly prescribing pain pills and other drugs.

Michael L. Cummings, 63, pleaded guilty on 13 charges of prescribing drugs without a legitimate medical purpose and outside the source of professional practice, according to a news release.

Cummings was initially charged with prescribing drugs that resulted in the overdose deaths of three patients in 2014, but federal prosecutors dropped those three counts of the indictment.

Federal prosecutors said in a motion that Cummings was one of the most prolific prescribers in the state between 2012 and 2014, even though Clinton County has only about 10,000 residents.

That “aberrant” prescribing activity caught the attention of federal authorities, who investigated along with Kentucky State Police.

Police watched Cummings’ office in Albany and saw cars from outside the county and state, and also got records showing his patients were filling prescriptions outside the county — evidence “indicative of a medical practice that attracted and/or catered to people who were either abusing or diverting prescription pain medications,” according to the prosecution argument.

Cummings improperly prescribed OxyContin, hydrocodone, Valium, Xanax and other drugs, according to his plea agreement.

The Kentucky Board of Medical Licensure suspended Cummings’ license after he was indicted in April 2017.

The board lists his status as retired.

Cummings is to be sentenced in June. The maximum sentence on the charges would be 145 years in prison and a fine of $7.25 million, though Cummings’ sentence is likely to be much lower under advisory federal guidelines.