{"id":10835,"date":"2016-03-06T08:27:46","date_gmt":"2016-03-06T15:27:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lastbestnews.com\/site\/?p=10835"},"modified":"2016-03-06T08:29:03","modified_gmt":"2016-03-06T15:29:03","slug":"former-state-hospital-doctor-arrested-on-drug-charges","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/2016\/03\/former-state-hospital-doctor-arrested-on-drug-charges\/","title":{"rendered":"Former state hospital doctor arrested on drug charges"},"content":{"rendered":"

A former state doctor who is facing an indefinite suspension of his medical license for\u00a0alleged illegal drug use was arrested in Butte<\/a>\u00a0Friday night on misdemeanor charges of disorderly conduct and possession of\u00a0dangerous drugs.<\/p>\n

Mark Jay Catalanello<\/a> was a staff physician at the\u00a0Montana State Hospital in Warm Springs and served as the medical director at the\u00a0Montana Chemical Dependency Center in Butte until October, when the Montana Board\u00a0of Medical Examiners temporarily suspended his medical license amid accusations that\u00a0he was using illegal drugs.<\/p>\n

\"Cata\"<\/a>

Mark Jay Catalanello<\/p><\/div>\n

The state placed Catalanello on paid administrative leave following his Sept. 29\u00a0suspension and his last day working for the state was Oct. 19, 2015.<\/p>\n

Catalanello has a long history<\/a>\u00a0of\u00a0drug and alcohol abuse and has had his medical license suspended in Montana and\u00a0revoked in California following felony drug arrests in 2001 and 2005.<\/p>\n

A Montana Free Press<\/a>\u00a0investigation into Catalanello that began\u00a0more than a year ago uncovered a lengthy record of drug and alcohol abuse, felony arrests, failed rehabilitation, refusals to participate in\u00a0mandated drug and alcohol screenings, and suspended and revoked medical licenses in\u00a0Montana and California.<\/p>\n

Butte police officials on Saturday refused to release details of Catalanello’s arrest, but a\u00a0jailer confirmed that Catalanello had been taken into custody Friday night. As of this\u00a0writing Catalanello was being held on a $995 bond.<\/p>\n

A source with knowledge of the circumstances surrounding Catalanello’s arrest contacted the Montana Free Press on Saturday. The source said police were called\u00a0after Catalanello reportedly created a “disturbance” at a drive\u00ad-through restaurant in Rocker,\u00a0just west of Butte. The source said\u00a0Catalanello was located by police at a nearby bar\u00a0and was “extremely agitated and confrontational” with police before being arrested.<\/p>\n

A spokesman for the Butte Police Department directed questions about the case to Butte\u00a0Undersheriff George Skuletich, who was out of the office until Monday. An email sent to\u00a0Skuletich seeking additional information was not immediately answered.<\/p>\n

Last month Catalanello failed to show up at a trial before a Montana Department of Labor<\/a> hearings examiner to\u00a0defend himself against allegations leveled in October that he relapsed in violation of the\u00a0board \u00adimposed terms that allowed him to get his medical license back following a 2005\u00a0suspension.<\/p>\n

An adjudication panel of the Montana Board of Medical Examiners is expected to take up\u00a0Catalanello’s case at a meeting in Helena on March 11. The panel is expected to consider\u00a0a recommendation that Catalanello’s medical license be suspended indefinitely.

\"CapreAir_Variable\"<\/a><\/div><\/div><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A former state doctor who is facing an indefinite suspension of his medical license for\u00a0alleged illegal drug use was arrested in Butte\u00a0Friday night on misdemeanor charges of disorderly conduct and possession of\u00a0dangerous drugs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":80,"featured_media":10836,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[3940,3941,3939,2106],"class_list":["post-10835","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-butte-police-department","tag-george-skuletich","tag-mark-jay-catalenello","tag-montana-state-hospital","prominence-category-featured"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10835","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/80"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10835"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10835\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10836"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10835"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10835"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10835"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}