A Michigan physician has been convicted of using an online ADHD service to distribute more than two million stimulant pills without the medical assessment that controlled-substance prescribing requires.
A federal jury found Jonathan Decker guilty of conspiracy and six substantive distribution counts on Friday. The case concerns prescriptions written through Done, a telehealth platform whose executives and clinicians have faced a broader federal prosecution over stimulant sales.
The evidence showed that Decker prescribed Adderall, methamphetamine and other amphetamines to subscribers he did not examine, including people with substance-use disorders and serious psychiatric diagnoses. Prosecutors said warning signs were not merely absent from the records; in some instances, patients or family members told the platform that stimulants were worsening psychosis or other symptoms.
Decker earned more than $1 million from the prescriptions and received referral payments for bringing other clinicians to the platform. He is the eleventh person convicted in the wider case. The government says Done personnel distributed more than 37 million pills nationally and used online advertising to turn quick access to medication into a subscription-retention strategy.
The verdict does not decide Decker’s sentence. No sentencing date has been set. The combined statutory maximum on the counts is 140 years, but federal maximums are not forecasts; the judge must calculate the advisory guidelines and consider Decker’s conduct, history and the need for a proportionate sentence.
The prosecution also puts a hard legal edge on the debate over telemedicine. Remote care can widen access, but the medium does not remove a clinician’s duty to diagnose, monitor risk and exercise independent judgment. A platform’s software, growth targets or subscription model cannot substitute for the examination and safeguards required when a prescription can create dependency or aggravate mental illness.
