Frank Incognito, 46, of Englishtown, New Jersey, was sentenced on July 29 to 30 months in prison for conspiring with doctors and others to purchase nearly $50 million worth of oncology and ophthalmology medications under false pretenses and reselling them for profit, United States Attorney Robert Frazer announced.
Incognito previously pled guilty before U.S. District Judge Susan D. Wigenton to conspiring to unlawfully resell various medications that had been purchased by healthcare entities through the medical licenses and offices of several doctors. These purchases were made with the representation that the drugs would be used to treat the doctors’ own patients; however, they were instead resold by Incognito and his coconspirators.
For several years, Incognito worked as an operations manager at VRC Medical Services and Investigational Drug Delivery (VRC/IDD), wholesale drug distributors based in Sewaren, New Jersey. He conspired with others at VRC/IDD as well as multiple doctors to obtain expensive prescription medications—primarily cold-chain biologic infusion drugs used for cancers, macular degeneration, and autoimmune diseases—that he could not otherwise access. The scheme involved making false representations to pharmaceutical manufacturers and authorized distributors about the intended use of these drugs.
The fraudulent activity took place from approximately June 2012 through January 2019. During this period, more than $47.7 million worth of prescription drugs were bought and sold illegally through straw purchases made via medical practices controlled by cooperating physicians. Incognito is the third defendant sentenced in connection with this case; doctors Anise Kachadourian and Joel Lerner have also been sentenced.
U.S. Attorney Frazer credited special agents from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Office of Criminal Investigations New York Field Office under Special Agent in Charge Fernando McMillan, along with special agents from the U.S. Attorney’s Office under Acting Special Agent in Charge Matthew Maltese, for their work on this investigation leading up to Incognito’s guilty plea.
The government was represented by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Joseph McFarlane and Sara Aliabadi from Camden.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of New Jersey prosecutes federal crimes across the state—including those involving healthcare fraud—and represents the United States in civil matters statewide; it is part of the Department of Justice with offices in Newark, Trenton, and Camden staffed by about 170 attorneys and support personnel advancing community safety through law enforcement coordination, according to its official website.