Michigan doctor gets 45-year prison sentence for healthcare fraud
By Suzannah Gonzales
(Reuters) - A federal judge on Friday sentenced a Detroit-area doctor who admitted performing unnecessary procedures on hundreds of cancer patients to 45 years in prison, prosecutors said.
Dr. Farid Fata, 50, who pleaded guilty in September to more than a dozen healthcare and financial fraud charges, was accused of administering unnecessary infusions or injections on 553 patients and submitting about $34 million of fraudulent claims to Medicare and private insurers.
"Dr. Fata did not care for patients; he exploited them as commodities. He over-treated, under-treated and outright lied to patients about whether they had cancer so that he could maximize his own profits," U.S. Attorney Barbara McQuade said in a news release.
U.S. District Court Judge Paul Borman in Detroit also ordered Fata to forfeit $17.6 million, the U.S. Justice Department said in the release.
A resident of Oakland Township, Michigan, Fata pleaded guilty to 13 counts of healthcare fraud, one count of conspiracy to pay or receive kickbacks and two counts of money laundering.
Fata admitted to prescribing and administering unnecessary aggressive chemotherapy, cancer treatments and infusion therapies to patients to increase his billings to Medicare and private insurance companies, the release said.
He also admitted to soliciting kickbacks from a hospice and home healthcare service in exchange for his referral of patients to those facilities, it said.
(Reporting by Suzannah Gonzales in Chicago)
