Michigan doctor who led ‘shots for pills’ opioid scheme gets 16.5 years in prison

WAYNE COUNTY, Mich. (FOX 2) – A Michigan physician was sentenced to 16.5 years in jail after authorities say he led an opioid scheme that offered medicine to sufferers in alternate for medically pointless injections.

Francisco Patino, 68, of Wayne County, was convicted of conspiracy to commit well being care fraud and wire fraud, well being care fraud, conspiracy to defraud the USA and pay and obtain well being care kickbacks, conspiracy to commit cash laundering, and cash laundering in September 2021. 

In keeping with courtroom paperwork and proof at trial, Patino owned a number of medical practices and scientific laboratories in Michigan. At these areas, he developed a “shots-for-pills” protocol, the place sufferers have been required to obtain pointless again injections in alternate for prescriptions of excessive doses of opioid that they didn’t medically want. This included excessively prescribing extremely addictive opioids to his sufferers.

In alternate for the opioids, the sufferers would obtain – or be billed as if they’d obtained – pointless aspect joint or nerve block injections, each profitable spinal injections, feds mentioned. If sufferers refused to simply accept the injections, Patino would withhold their prescriptions for the medicine, authorities mentioned. 

From January 2012 by means of July 2017, Patino billed Medicare for extra of those injections than some other supplier within the nation. In 2016 and 2017, Patino prescribed extra 30-milligram Oxycodone tablets than some other supplier in Michigan.

Twenty-one different folks have additionally been sentenced on this scheme.

“This defendant exploited weak sufferers scuffling with habit by overprescribing extremely harmful opioid tablets and exposing them to pointless and typically painful injections,” mentioned Assistant Legal professional Normal Kenneth A. Well mannered, Jr. of the Justice Division’s Felony Division. “To make issues worse, the defendant and his co-conspirators submitted over $250 million in false and fraudulent claims to Medicare, Medicaid, and different medical health insurance packages. As this case demonstrates, the Division of Justice will proceed to relentlessly fight well being care fraud, significantly the place defendants endanger sufferers by offering addictive substances and billing for pointless procedures.”

Authorities mentioned Patino additionally pioneered the shots-for-pills protocol whereas working with CEO Mashiyat Rashid of the Tri-County Wellness Group of medical suppliers in Michigan and Ohio. In 2018, Rashid pleaded responsible to conspiracy to commit well being care fraud and wire fraud, and cash laundering and was sentenced to fifteen years in jail on March 3, 2021. 

Others convicted at trial or by responsible plea embody 12 different physicians who have been educated in Patino’s protocols, together with many non-physician defendants who participated within the conspiracy.

The 5 different defendants most just lately sentenced for his or her half on this scheme embody:

• Yasser Mozeb, 40, of Hamtramck, Michigan, the workplace supervisor of the Tri-County clinics, was sentenced to 5 years in jail and ordered to pay over $46 million in restitution following his responsible plea to at least one rely of conspiracy to commit well being care fraud and one rely of conspiracy to defraud the USA and pay and obtain unlawful kickbacks and bribes.
• Kashif Rasool, 47, of Troy, Michigan, a doctor, was sentenced to 32 months in jail and ordered to pay almost $2 million in restitution following his responsible plea to at least one rely of conspiracy to commit well being care fraud.
• Tariq Siddiqi, 45, of Sterling Heights, Michigan, a bodily therapist and residential well being proprietor, was sentenced to 30 months in jail and ordered to pay over $880,000 in restitution following his responsible plea to at least one rely of well being care fraud conspiracy in connection together with his cost of unlawful kickbacks for the referral of sufferers from the clinics for medically pointless dwelling well being companies.
• Tasadaq Ali Ahmad, 55, of Canton, Michigan, the proprietor of a house well being company, was sentenced to 58 months in jail and ordered to pay over $20 million in restitution following his responsible plea to at least one rely of conspiracy to commit well being care fraud and one rely of conspiracy to defraud the USA and pay and obtain kickbacks.
• Stephanie Borgula, 42, of Livonia, Michigan, a licensed bodily therapist, was sentenced to fifteen months in jail and ordered to pay over $825,000 in restitution following her responsible plea to at least one rely of conspiracy to commit well being care fraud.