Two local men among six charged with conspiracy to distribute pain pills

Two local men are among six people named in a federal indictment stemming from an investigation into drug trafficking at a Tennessee pain clinic.

James Bradley Combs, 40, of Woodbine and Larry Karr, 73, of Keavy were named in the superseding indictment handed down Jan. 25 in U.S. District Court in London.

Combs and Karr, along with co-defendants Timothy Gowder, 70, of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, Gary Moore, 66, of Ooltewah, Tennessee, Anwar Mithavayani, 54, and Pete Tyndale, 46, both of south Florida, are each charged with conspiracy to distribute and dispense a quantity of pills containing controlled substances, to include oxycodone and oxymorphine.

In addition, Karr was indicted on two counts of distributing oxycodone, while Combs faces a single count of distributing oxycodone.

According to officials with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Kentucky, Mithavayani and Tyndale were the owners of the Tennessee Pain Institute, which was closed in May 2016 soon after a search warrant was served.

Gowder and Moore each worked as physicians at the clinic.

Mithavayani, Tyndale, Gowder and Moore are each charged with multiple counts of money laundering.

The superseding indictment alleges that the defendants received more than $8 million as a result of their drug trafficking.

According to the indictment, Mithavayani, Tyndale, Gowder and Moore used financial institutions in Whitley, Knox, Laurel, McCreary and Bell Counties to transfer funds from the sale of the illegal drugs to and from as part of the money laundering activities.

The indictment is the result of joint investigation by the DEA, IRS Criminal Investigation Division, Kentucky Attorney General’s Office and the Kentucky State Police.