Feds drop charges against Angier company president on run for 12 years

After searching for more than a decade for the head of an Angier plant that sold bacteria-tainted syringes that killed five people, federal authorities have given up and dropped criminal charges against him.

Posted 8:14 p.m. Oct 12, 2021 — Updated 9:24 p.m. Oct 12, 2021

RALEIGH, N.C. — After searching for more than a decade for the head of an Angier plant that sold bacteria-tainted syringes that killed five people, federal authorities have given up and dropped criminal charges against him.

Dushyant Patel was president and chief executive of AM2PAT, which sold syringes filled with saline and heparin, a blood thinner, to hospitals and clinics nationwide. The syringes were used to flush intravenous lines during cancer treatments, kidney dialysis and other procedures.

Syringes from AM2PAT were taken off the market in 2008 and the Angier plant closed following outbreaks of Serratia, a bacterial infection, in Colorado, Texas, Illinois and Florida. In addition to the five deaths, about 300 people were sickened.

Federal prosecutors said plant operators failed to follow rules for checking sterility so that the production line would move faster. The syringes were supposed to be loaded in a sterile room, but authorities had photos showing a room with peeling paint and a window fan held together with duct tape.

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In addition to the sloppy surroundings, plant managers knowingly backdated sterility testing logs to make it appear that the proper procedures had been followed, authorities said.

Patel was indicted in February 2009 on 10 federal charges, including fraud and selling adulterated medical devices. But authorities have never been able to locate him. They said he might have fled to his native India.

"The defendant's whereabouts for approximately the last eleven years are unknown, and if this case was to be tried today, the government is not confident sufficient evidence still exists to prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt," Acting U.S. Attorney G. Norman Acker III wrote in a motion to dismiss the charges against Patel last week.

U.S. District Judge Terrence Boyle granted the motion, ending the case against Patel.

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