Corporate Compliance

Owner of Miami medical equipment company sentenced to 130 months in prison

Compliance Monitor, July 9, 2008

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On July 2, Gustavo Smith was sentenced to nearly 11 years in prison, ordered to forfeit $287,000 and pay $1,988,969 in restitution to the Department of Health and Human Services  for his involvement in a healthcare fraud scheme. Judge Marcia G. Cooke also sentenced Smith to three years of supervised release following his prison time.
 
Smith, owner of two Miami area durable medical equipment (DME) companies, was convicted April 23  on 17 counts including conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to commit healthcare fraud, and conspiracy to cause the submission of false claims.
 
According to the Department of Justice (DOJ) release, Smith submitted claims to Medicare for DME that was never delivered and defrauded Medicare of $4.6 million. According to testimony, Smith used Medicare numbers and names of beneficiaries to bill Medicare without the beneficiaries’ knowledge. Smith also used the names of physicians who had never heard of Smith, or his companies.
 
To read the full DOJ press release, click here



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