LaSalle County doctor pleads guilty to dispensing drugs for cash, sex

A LaSalle County doctor faces up to 20 years in federal prison after pleading guilty to illegally dispensing prescription drugs in exchange for cash or sex.

Constantino Perales, 66, pleaded guilty Monday to conspiracy to possess a controlled substance with intent to distribute, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office.

In the summer of 2013, Perales illegally prescribed Oxycodone and Xanax to Andrew Strandell, who then sold the pills on the black market, prosecutors said. Strandell would then pay Perales between $15 and $20 per pill for some of the drugs that he was able to sell.

Perales also admitted that between 2011 and 2013, he illegally dispensed drugs to three opioid-dependent patients in exchange for sex, prosecutors said. He required the patients to have sex with him in order to keep receiving the medications.

His Illinois medical license was suspended and he surrendered his DEA Registration Certificate after authorities executed a search warrant at his Peru office in August 2013, prosecutors said. Peru is about 50 miles west of Joliet.

Perales faces up to 20 years in prison and a maximum fine of $1 million when he is sentenced March 22 by U.S. District Judge Amy J. St. Eve, prosecutors said.

Strandell, 36, of Sandwich, pleaded guilty earlier this year to the same conspiracy charge as Perales, prosecutors said. His sentencing hearing has not yet been scheduled.