Michael Hill, Lauren Burnett admit to illegally obtaining painkillers

A south coast school teacher and his model wife, who once walked the runway in New York, have admitted to stockpiling more than a thousand strong painkillers.

More than quadrupling their prescribed dose of strong painkillers by shopping the scripts, a school teacher and his model wife have landed themselves in front of a magistrate.

Michael Hill and Lauren Burnett have admitted to a less than elaborate plan which saw them use the same scripts several times at different pharmacies to obtain more than 1400 painkiller tablets.

The parents’ total haul was 940 tablets of Endone and 476 Targin pills.

Michael Hill and Lauren Burnett from Culburra Beach will be sentenced for obtaining prohibited drugs by false representation. Picture: Facebook

Burnett has had a colourful modelling career, having walked the catwalk in New York as a model, she was also the second plus size model to feature on a Vogue cover.

Now boasting an online profile labelling herself a plus size model, she works for the likes of Big W, lingerie brand Naked Curve, MB Active by Michelle Bridges and in June walked the Australian Fashion Week catwalk for fashion designer Alexander Lyon.

She’s previously called out the “poor culture” of the modelling industry, telling media she was “constantly taking laxatives” to fit into supermodel clothing.

“I remember a friend of mine giving me some pills that were called Size Zero,” she said in a 2019 article.

Meanwhile, Hill hasn’t worked in the classroom for sometime, with police facts stating he is on workers compensation.

Pleading guilty to 27 charges between them, the couple obtained prohibited drugs by false representation. Hill is facing 17 charges, while Burnett has 10 charges, court documents show.

According to police facts, Hill attended the Berry Post Office several times to fax a copy of legitimate scripts to pharmacies in Nowra and Culburra Beach between July and August last year.

Burnett would follow the fax trail, filling the scripts at the chemists and taking the drugs home to the couple’s Culburra Beach house, which was raided by police in November 2020.

On multiple other occasions, Hill requested the post office fax the scripts to several different chemists, before following his own tracks to collect the painkillers.

Plus size model Lauren Burnett and her husband Michael Hill obtained more than 1400 painkillers between them through false representation.

Plus size model Lauren Burnett has previously called out the mainstream modelling industry for it’s beauty standards.

The pharmacies would mark the scripts as ‘owing’, awaiting the original script to be posted or personally delivered, but on several occasions it never arrived.

Once the original is lodged, it is listed as cancelled and cannot be filled repeatedly. The couple bypassed this by not presenting the originals, and continuing to fax scripts from the post office to several different pharmacies in the northern Shoalhaven.

“Ordinarily, further prescriptions cannot be filled to that person by the pharmacy until the original document is received for the outstanding owing,” court documents said.

“Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, there has been some leniency to the regulations by all medical practitioners in the fulfilment of prescriptions.”

There is no suggestion the doctors who wrote the scripts, or the pharmacies who filled them knew about the illegal activity at the time.

Burnett was legitimately prescribed 80 tablets of Endone between August 13 and August 21 last year but obtained 400 tablets from different pharmacies throughout the northern Shoalhaven.

Between July 30 and August 21, she was prescribed 56 tablets of Targin, but quadrupled the prescription and gained access to 224 tablets of the painkiller.

Hill secured 540 Endone tablets after being prescribed 220 Endone tablets from several doctors between July 30 and August 28.

He also obtained 252 tablets of Targin between July 15 and August 28, having been prescribed just 56 tablets.

Both painkillers are listed as Schedule 1 drugs under the Drugs Misuse Trafficking Act, and are prescribed only to patients recovering from surgery or in chronic pain. Repeat prescriptions cannot be written.

Targin is a slow-release drug, and “in most cases people are only prescribed two tablets at most a day”, court documents state.

During the raid on their home, police allegedly located and seized medical documents, scripts, prescription medication and prescription medication packaging with the couple’s names on the box, and clothing seen on Hill and Burnett in CCTV from inside a host of pharmacies.

The matter is listed for sentence in Nowra Local Court later this month.