Turkish citizen sentenced in St. Louis to 27 months in federal prison for cancer-drug fraud

ST. LOUIS — A Turkish citizen has been sentenced to 27 months in prison for smuggling counterfeit and adulterated cancer treatment drugs into the United States.

Ozkan Semizoglu of Istanbul was sentenced Tuesday in U.S. District Court in St. Louis. He pleaded guilty in July to smuggling three shipments of phony and tainted prescription drugs from Turkey to the St. Louis County suburb of Chesterfield. The drugs were labeled as “gifts” or “documents” to conceal their identity.