New Hope man sentenced in health care fraud case that involved Etowah County men

A New Hope man received an 80-month prison sentence last week in a health care fraud case that included two guilty pleas by Etowah County residents on related charges.

John Hornbuckle, 53, former owner of QBR, was sentenced by Chief U.S. District Court Judge L. Scott Coogler, according to a news release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for Alabama’s Northern District.

Hornbuckle pleaded guilty in November 2022 to one count of conspiracy to commit health care fraud and another count of conspiracy to receive kickbacks.

According to his plea agreement, QBR during his ownership (2012 to 2018) billed insurers millions of dollars for electro-diagnostic testing that its technicians performed, regardless of whether there was a medical need for them.

QBR in turn paid medical providers (including Medicare and other government programs) a per-patient fee for the tests they ordered from the company that were reimbursed by insurers. They were disguised as hourly payments for the provider and its staff’s time; the provider was actually paid a fee per each patient who was tested.

Insurers paid more than $9 million for those medically unnecessary tests.

Hornbuckle was ordered to pay $9,192,005.20 in restitution and a $250,000 fine, and to forfeit $176,449.19.

Brian Bowman, 41, of Attalla, and James Ewing Ray, 52, of Gadsden, each pleaded guilty last November to health care fraud conspiracy.

Ray, owner of Integrity Medical LLC, which markets health care items and services to medical providers, entered an additional guilty plea to kickback conspiracy.

Bowman and Ray in their respective plea agreements admitted marketing QBR’s testing to medical providers, and earning a fee for each test ordered. They are awaiting sentencing.

Bowman’s two co-defendants, Dr. Mark Murphy and his wife, Jennifer Murphy, both 66, of Lewisburg, Tennessee, were earlier sentenced to 20 years each in prison after being convicted for conspiracy to unlawfully distribute controlled substances and to commit health care fraud, for conspiring to defraud the United States and for receiving kickbacks.

They owned and operated North Alabama Pain Services in Decatur and Madison until it closed in 2017. Evidence presented at their trial last year showed they took more than $1 million in kickbacks. Bowman in his plea agreement admitted to taking nearly $1 million.

The FBI and the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of the Inspector General investigated the cases. Assistant U.S. Attorneys J.B. Ward and Don Long prosecuted them.

This article originally appeared on The Gadsden Times: Health care fraud defendant sentenced