Following a three-week trial at Southwark Crown Court, Jignesh Patel, 46, of 11 Princes Park Manor, Royal Drive, London N11 and Rahil Patel 42, of 11 Churston Avenue London E13 were found guilty on all counts: three counts of fraud by false representation and two of converting criminal property.
Sentencing is due to take place on Friday 16 October 2026, when a timetable for Proceeds of Crime Act (POCA) confiscation proceedings will also be set.
Jignesh Patel is a pharmacist who owns Wise Pharmacy, 93 Fore Street, Edmonton, London. He also owns a pharmaceutical wholesale business called Actipharm Limited.
The investigation concerned the dispensing of high-cost drugs, which are normally dispensed in a hospital environment, and payment for prescriptions originating from four NHS Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) areas: Barnet, Enfield, Newham, and Tower Hamlets. The CCGs had obtained copies of prescriptions, and checks made with the prescribing GPs showed there was no documentation to support the patient's need for the drug, or that it had been prescribed.
Checks by the Local Counter Fraud Specialist (LCFS) identified seven high-cost drugs being dispensed at Wise Pharmacy contrary to CCG expectations. The drugs were Sprycel, Noxafil, Atripla, Eviplera, Tobramycin, Truvada and Viread. The drugs of most concern were identified as Sprycel and Noxafil.
An alert sent by NHS England to pharmacies in north London in 2016 highlighted that it was unlikely there would be a need to dispense the drugs identified, and that pharmacists should contact the GP to confirm authenticity if presented with a prescription for them.
The NHS Counter Fraud Authority (NHSCFA) obtained all the prescriptions dispensed by Wise Pharmacy for the period May 2015 to November 2017. Examination of these prescriptions identified 1,639 false prescriptions for 440 individual patients and 6,983 dispensed items.
Jignesh Patel was arrested on 6 December 2017 and interviewed under caution. He gave a no comment interview. A search of his properties was carried out at the time of arrest, during which images of computers and mobile telephones were taken and £190,000 in cash was seized as part of the investigation.
The GPs shown as prescribers were interviewed and confirmed the prescriptions were false.
The two medicines showing the largest losses were Noxafil (posaconazole) and Sprycel (dasatinib) used in the treatment of leukaemia. To obtain these drugs, a pharmacist must demonstrate a legitimate clinical need for them to be purchased and dispensed.
Further investigation identified a payment of £28,920 for Noxafil, and invoices from Actipharm Ltd to pharmaceutical wholesalers in Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark and Germany. Information from these companies was obtained using European Investigation Orders (EIOs), following a submission by the Crown Prosecution Service, which were sent to prosecutors in the Netherlands, Germany and Belgium in November 2018. In May 2019, NHSCFA staff attended a meeting at Eurojust in The Hague, where a presentation was made to the German investigating authorities on the investigation and the information required from the search. In March 2020, Danish police, with the assistance of NHSCFA staff, attended a wholesale business in Copenhagen. Material obtained from the EIO requests was examined and compared with purchases of Sprycel and Noxafil from manufacturers and distributors. This material showed a connection between Wise Pharmacy obtaining the drugs from the manufacturer using false prescriptions, the sale of the drugs through Actipharm, and their receipt by European pharmaceutical wholesale businesses. The investigation identified that the total value of Noxafil and Sprycel sold by Actipharm to companies in Europe totalled £779,405.
Following the alert sent by NHS England, Wise Pharmacy stopped claiming reimbursement from the NHS for Noxafil and Sprycel but continued to use NHS prescriptions to purchase the drugs. The amount not claimed back was identified by the investigation as £27,000 for Sprycel and £474,300 for Noxafil.
In the UK, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) regulates the distribution of drugs and requires wholesale businesses such as Actipharm to employ a Responsible Person (RP). An RP is responsible for ensuring that the conditions under which a licence was granted have been, and are being, complied with. The RP for Actipharm at the time of these offences was Rahil Patel. As the Responsible Person for Actipharm Ltd, Rahil Patel was responsible for accurate record keeping and had knowledge of where Actipharm obtained pharmaceutical drugs and which companies they were sold to. The investigation established that Actipharm was selling Sprycel and Noxafil to other wholesale companies despite not having purchased them, meaning they could only have been obtained through Wise Pharmacy.
Rahil Patel was interviewed under caution on 14 February 2020. He answered no comment to all questions put to him during the interview.
A number of text messages between Rahil Patel and Jignesh Patel regarding the purchase of false prescriptions and drugs were found and formed part of the evidence at trial. These included:
“Drop the nox to the warehouse today”
“U WANT MORE Sprycel N NOXA let me know asap”.
Ben Harrison, Head of Operations and Engagement at the NHS Counter Fraud Authority, said:
"Our expert investigation team followed the evidence, both in the UK and Europe, to bring these individuals to justice. This case demonstrates that there is no hiding place for those who seek to defraud the NHS.
"Jignesh Patel and Rahil Patel worked together for several years, obtaining drugs using false prescriptions and selling them on to European pharmaceutical wholesale businesses.
"We will actively pursue any criminals that seek to defraud the NHS of vital funds and every pound stolen from the NHS is a pound that cannot be spent on frontline services, and the NHSCFA is committed to pursuing those responsible."
You can report NHS fraud anonymously on 0800 028 40 60, our 24-hour reporting line powered by Crimestoppers. You can also report it confidentially on our website at www.cfa.nhs.uk/reportfraud.