St. Louis, MO - Reuben Goodwin, 53, of Richton Park, IL; Phillip Jones, 58, of Markham, IL; and Dwight McTizic, 47, of Hazel Crest, IL; were convicted by a jury today in U.S. District Court of conspiring to pay illegal kickbacks and to commit health care fraud and 11 counts of health care fraud. The trial took place before U.S. District Court Judge Audrey G. Fleissig, who scheduled the sentencing hearing for July 12, 2019.
According to trial documents, Anthony Camillo, the managing partner of AMS Medical Laboratory Inc. (AMS) in St. Louis, Missouri, paid illegal kickbacks to “marketers" Goodwin, Jones, McTizic, and others who referred specimens, such as blood, saliva, and urine, to AMS. Per the agreements with the marketers, Camillo and AMS submitted reimbursement claims to Medicare and Medicaid for tests performed on the medical specimens, although the marketers and Camillo knew the Medicare and Medicaid Programs would not pay for tests on specimens obtained by illegal kickbacks. (The Federal Anti-Kickback law prohibits payments to individuals on a per item or percentage basis in return for referring services reimbursed by Medicare and Medicaid.). Anthony Camillo paid the marketers 50% of the profit and in some instances paid the marketers as much as $200 for each specimen referred to AMS. According to trial documents, Jones, Goodwin and McTizic were associated with several health service businesses in the Chicago area and referred specimens to AMS. The specimens were often obtained at health fairs held in businesses and churches in Illinois and Indiana. In many instances, the marketers used the names of doctors on orders for tests, although the doctors did not know the patients and had never ordered the tests.
Defendants face a penalty of five years imprisonment on the conspiracy count, ten years imprisonment on each health care fraud count, and a $250,000 fine on each count.
This case was investigated by the Office of the Inspector General of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the Missouri Medicaid Fraud Control Unit of the Missouri Attorney General’s Office. Assistant United States Attorneys Dorothy McMurtry and Gwendolyn Carroll handled the case for the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)
