Kentucky man convicted for role in Tennessee-based pill mill operation

LONDON, Ky. (WTVQ)- Court officials say a Tennessee doctor, two Florida clinic owners, and a Kentucky man were convicted Monday on oxycodone-trafficking charges.

A federal jury has convicted Timothy Gowder, from Chattanooga, Anwar Mithavayani, and Pete Tyndale, clinic owners from Florida, for conspiracy to distribute oxycodone and oxymorphone.

41-year-old James Bradley Combs, from Woodbine, Kentucky, was convicted of possession with intent to distribute oxycodone.

According to testimony at trial, Gowder and the clinic owners worked together to run an illicit pain clinic near Chattanooga called the Tennessee Pain Institute, which drug addicts and traffickers in Kentucky and other places used as their supplier. Evidence showed that after the Tennessee Department of Health investigated the institute, Tyndale and Mithavayani opened a new pain clinic in North Carolina to cater to the same Kentucky population.

All four involved were indicted in January 2018. Combs faces up to 40 years in prison.