ALTOONA -- Dr. Rebecca Delbaggio turned herself in Tuesday morning after the State Attorney General's Office alleged that she wrote illegal prescriptions for her boyfriend, who was not her patient.
She faces 14 felony drug counts and one count of conspiracy as well as dozens of misdemeanor charges.
Delbaggio was a pediatrician at UPMC Children's Community Pediatrics in Hollidaysburg, according to the criminal complaint.
Pittsburgh-based UPMC media relations manager Andrea Kunicky said that Delbaggio was first suspended, then ultimately terminated when the company discovered the illegal activity.
Agent Matt Massaro of the Attorney General's Office told the magisterial district judge at Delbaggio's arraignment that the area suffers from an opioid epidemic, adding, "This is where it starts."
The criminal complaint said that Delbaggio had been having an affair with 26 year-old Andrew Smithmyer, who was too old to be a pediatric patient, and that she wrote him prescriptions for both Xanax and Oxycodone over the past two years.
Delbaggio, alongside her attorney Brian Grabill, told the judge that she did not have any drug or alcohol problems and that she has never been arrested before.
The judge set her bail at $50,000 unsecured, with a condition that she could not return to her former place of work because agents said that several witnesses still work there.
Criminals typically exit the court from the public front entrance, but Delbaggio was escorted by her attorney out the private back door.
SOURCE: wjactv
