56 Months’ Jail for Lab Technician Caught in Texas Toxicology Scam
Case: A former toxicology testing company account rep pled guilty to conspiring with a medical clinic lab technician to steal patient identities and urine specimens from the clinic and send them to the testing company without a physician order or patient consent so they could pocket commissions and collection fees. Along the way, they forged patient consent signatures, falsified medical records and created registration forms and other fictitious documents to make it look like the unapproved toxicology screens were properly ordered. As a result of the scheme, Medicare was billed $836,788 between May and December 2015. Significance: The account rep was sentenced to 56 months followed by three years of supervised release; in exchange prosecutors dropped the remaining 17 charges against him and the lab technician, who’ll be sentenced on April 17. Each defendant will also pay $166,866 in restitution.
Case: A former toxicology testing company account rep pled guilty to conspiring with a medical clinic lab technician to steal patient identities and urine specimens from the clinic and send them to the testing company without a physician order or patient consent so they could pocket commissions and collection fees. Along the way, they forged patient consent signatures, falsified medical records and created registration forms and other fictitious documents to make it look like the unapproved toxicology screens were properly ordered. As a result of the scheme, Medicare was billed $836,788 between May and December 2015.
Significance: The account rep was sentenced to 56 months followed by three years of supervised release; in exchange prosecutors dropped the remaining 17 charges against him and the lab technician, who’ll be sentenced on April 17. Each defendant will also pay $166,866 in restitution.
Subscribe to view Essential
Start a Free Trial for immediate access to this article