Based on the line of questioning Tuesday it was hard to tell who was on trial — a doctor accused of writing prescriptions to feed the drug habit of his live-in girlfriend, the girlfriend or the pharmacist who sold the pain killers.

After a day consumed by jury selection, the prescription forgery and conspiracy trial of Dr. Lawrence Francis Chenier III began Tuesday, but at times it seemed like his co-defendant Pattie Carr and Battlefield Discount Drugs owner John Storey were the ones really on trial.

Both are expected to testify today.

Nearly every question during cross-examination of state’s two witnesses Tuesday— Warren County investigator Chris Satcher and DEA Special Agent Kim Dearman — focused on actions by Carr and Storey, rather than Chenier.

Prosecutors say Chenier wrote 73 prescriptions to fictitious patients created by Carr and filled those prescriptions at Battlefield Discount Drugs.

“If you’re going to write a prescription for somebody, you’ve got to see them,” Assistant District Attorney Lane Campbell said.

Storey had known Chenier, who lives in Vicksburg but practices medicine in Tallulah, for years, and abused the trust between them, Campbell said.

“A doctor can derail the whole system,” Campbell said.

The defense asserted that the pharmacist who sold the drugs to Carr was who derailed the system.

“John Storey caused this train wreck. He allowed this to go on,” Ross said, later reiterating, “Why is it that John Storey filled over 200 prescriptions before he decided something was wrong?”

Prosecutors spent most of the day presenting evidence, including more than 70 prescription bottles found at the home Chenier and Carr share at 100 Colonial Drive. More than 300 bottles were found in the home, Satcher said. Some were contained in plastic shopping bags in a closet of a bedroom shared by the couple.

“The pill bottles were bulging out on the sliding trap of the door,” Satcher said.

Two bottles written to fictitious patients were also on the nightstand next to the bed when narcotics agents raided the home in September 2011.

Prosecutors said the investigation began when Storey became suspicious of Carr picking up narcotics almost daily.

“He brought this all to light,” Campbell said.

Defense Attorney Marshall Sanders said he felt Storey reported Carr because he was afraid of the consequences he faced for violating pharmacy regulations.

“When the heat is getting to you, you call somebody else’s name,” Sanders said.

Carr, Sanders and Ross contended, is the true culprit.

They say she swiped Chenier’s prescription pad and was selling the drugs on the street without the doctor’s knowledge.

Satcher testified that the drugs cost approximately $30,000, and Carr paid exclusively with cash.

Prosecutors say that Chenier financed Carr’s drug habit.