Bethesda Doctor Pleads Guilty To Unlawfully Prescribing Pills

Monday, May 12, 2025, 10:15 A.M. ET. 2 Minute Read, By Art Fletcher: Englebrook Independent News,

GREENBELT, MD.- Last Friday, a 48-year-old Bethesda, Maryland, doctor learned she could be potentially facing up to 20 years in federal prison after pleading guilty to a federal charge of unlawfully prescribing controlled substances during a nearly four-year-long pill mill operation.  

     According to U.S. Attorney Kelly O. Hayes, on Friday, May 9, 2025, Anissa Maroff, 48, of Potomac, Maryland, appeared in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland and pleaded guilty before U.S. District Court Judge Theodore D. Chaung to one count of Illegal Distribution and Dispensing of Controlled Substances.

     Following entering her guilty plea, Judge Chaung accepted the plea and scheduled sentencing for Tuesday, August 19, 2025. At that time, Maroof faces up to 20 years in federal prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release. At sentencing, a U.S. District Court Judge will determine the term of imprisonment based on the seriousness of the offense and Maroof’s prior criminal history, if any.

According To The U.S. Attorney’s Office

     According to charging documents filed with the District Court, beginning in January 2019 and lasting through June 2022, Maroff knowingly caused the distribution and dispensing of Alprazolam, Amphetamine-dextrophetamine, and Buprenorphine. She committed acts with the knowledge that distributing and dispensing the controlled substances were outside the scope of professional practice and not for legitimate medical purposes.

     Maroof, a physician who was board-certified in addiction psychiatry, owned and operated a medical practice in Bethesda, Maryland. She also maintained a Drug Enforcement Administration registration number that allowed her to prescribe controlled substances.

     Through her medical practice, based in Maryland, Maroff provided patients from West Virginia with prescriptions for controlled substances, including Alprazolam, Amphetamine-dextroamphetamine, and Buprenorphine. Maroff prescribed the patient’s combinations of the three controlled substances without giving them warnings of the risks involved with combining them. Maroof also prescribed controlled substances even after they indicated that they were selling their excess supply of controlled substances through illicit means.

     Additionally, Maroof regularly prescribed controlled substances without actually seeing the patients. Maroof would call in prescriptions to local pharmacies for pickup and directed the patients to leave cash under her office door. She also advised patients on how to split fill their prescriptions between two different pharmacies.