Man pleads guilty to prescription fraud, will get counseling

An Albemarle County man accused of trying to obtain prescription drugs illegally and also of making a fake bomb will stay behind bars for nearly a year in hopes of getting help.

Circuit Judge Thomas H. Wood accepted a plea agreement Wednesday in Albemarle Circuit Court on behalf of 27-year-old Michael Brenden McCullough, who pleaded guilty to prescription fraud and possession of a hoax explosive.

As part of a plea agreement, the prosecution asked that McCullough be sentenced in August to allow him time to complete the Therapeutic Community program at the Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail and get a chance to transition from jail into an inpatient rehabilitation program.

McCullough’s former landlord found a bomb-like device while cleaning out the apartment in July 2008, but it turned out not to be a bomb, authorities said. The prescription fraud happened in August when McCullough called in a false prescription for Klonopin, a seizure drug, to a pharmacy, police said.