Andrew Rudin, 51, graduated from the University of Illinois and went to medical school at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City before completing a residency in Connecticut and completing cardiology fellowships at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago.

In April 2019, Rudin was indicted in Tennessee federal court on one count of conspiracy to distribute and dispense controlled substances, including hydrocodone, oxycodone and fentanyl. He has pleaded not guilty.

“The Government needs someone to blame for its malfeasance in the opioid pandemic,” Rudin’s attorney, Nishay Sanan, told Patch.

According to the indictment, Rudin and another doctor, Alexander Alperovich, knew that nurse practitioner Jeffrey Young was prescribing opioids “not for a legitimate medical purpose and outside the course of professional practice.”

The two doctors acted as supervising physicians for Young at his Jackson, Tennessee, clinic called Preventagenix, allowing their licenses and names to be used, while reviewing and signing off on charts and prescriptions, prosecutors said. Both doctors were paid from the proceeds of the alleged conspiracy, according to the charges.

Young, the self-described “Rock Doc,” is accused of prescribing nearly 1.5 million opioid and benzodiazepine pills over a three-year span. Before his arrest, Young produced a podcast and reality TV show pilot under his Rock Doc brand. The 2016 pilot never aired, and the Drug Enforcement Administration raided his clinic later that year.

Federal prosecutors allege Young would meet patients while intoxicated and exchange prescriptions for sexual acts, sometimes showing his employees photos of himself having sex at work immediately afterwards. Arguing to keep him detained ahead of trial, prosecutors said he had a history of threats, violence and intimidation against women, and they described video evidence of Young having sex with a woman who was nearly unconscious.

In May 2019, the month after Rudin’s indictment and arrest, he entered into an agreement with the New York State Board for Professional Medical Conduct that he would be forbidden from practicing medicine in New York state. It did not require him to admit any misconduct.

Rudin was also previously licensed to practice medicine in New Jersey, where his license expired in 2017, and Tennessee, where it expired 10 days after his indictment and prior to any disciplinary action, according to state regulators.

In a February 2021 enforcement action, the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation placed Rudin’s physician and surgeon license on probation through at least August 2023 and indefinitely suspended his controlled substance license. Disciplinary action in New York was listed as the reason for the suspension.

Sanan, the doctor’s defense attorney, said Rudin would seek to have his medical license restored.

“Dr. Rudin is looking forward to clear his name, reputation and license in what is nothing more that an over zealous federal government who has decided to go after the opioid problem in the wrong way,” Sanan said in an email. “Dr. Rudin was a preceptor to Mr. Young, he followed the rules and regulation as required by the State of Tennessee in his role as the Preceptor.”

In August, Young is scheduled to face trial in Memphis on 15 counts, including drug conspiracy, maintaining a drug-involved premises and unlawfully dispensing controlled substances to a pregnant woman. No trial date has been set for Alperovich or Rudin.