Courtesy Summit County Sheriff’s Office
BRECKENRIDGE — Former Silverthorne dentist Bonifacio Guillena III, 42, of Greeley, has been sentenced to three years in prison after pleading guilty in January to possession with intent to distribute a controlled substance, a Class 3 felony, according to a news release from the Fifth Judicial District Attorney’s Office.
The sentence stems from a March 30, 2018, raid at Comfort Dental on Blue River Parkway in Silverthorne, where a former employee accused Guillena of operating a “pill mill,” or illegally distributing prescription drugs, according to the release.
Silverthorne Police Department officers and federal Drug Enforcement Agency personnel raided the office on suspicion of prescription drug fraud, seizing hundreds of documents that revealed Guillena was illegally distributing prescriptions for controlled substances such as Xanax, Percocet and Oxycodone as early as February 2017, according to the release.
At the time of his arrest, Guillena was on probation for domestic violence. As part of his probation, he was ordered to perform urine tests but was accused of using other people’s urine to cheat the tests, according to the release. Charges related to the fraudulent urine tests were dismissed as part of the plea agreement.
Before his three-year prison sentence was handed down Monday, July 29, Guillena originally was sentenced April 1 to three years in Community Corrections. After his original sentencing, Guillena was released on furlough. During that time, he was arrested for stalking in Weld County, and he pleaded guilty to that felony charge, according to the relase.
Because of that arrest, the court rescinded the original Community Corrections sentence.
“The defendant not only abused his dental license and honorable practice, but he proved the harmful effects drugs and drug abuse can cause to so many,” District Attorney Bruce Brown was quoted as saying in the release. “Defendant (Guillena) was originally given the chance at a much lighter sentence in Community Corrections, but his reckless and dangerous actions showed prison is the right place for him to be now.”
A history of arrests
Guillena was first arrested in Colorado in October 2016 on suspicion of stalking, according to Colorado Bureau of Investigation records. That charge was dismissed, but Guillena was convicted of violating a protection order and sentenced to two years’ probation and 60 days in jail, according to the records.
In April 2017, Silverthorne police arrested Guillena on behalf of the Denver Police Department for a suspected protection order violation.
On March 29, 2018, a day before the raid, Guillena was arrested in Denver on an unrelated failure to appear warrant.
Guillena was issued a license to practice dentistry in Colorado in 2014, and it was suspended Dec. 1, 2017, by the state’s dental board. In May 2018, he surrendered his license to practice, according to the District Attorney’s Office.