A podiatrist and a patient recruiter were sentenced to prison and ordered to pay more than $7 million in restitution for their roles in a scheme to bilk TRICARE.
According to court documents and evidence presented at trial, Brian Carpenter, 58, of Paradise, Texas, was a podiatrist who signed prescriptions for compounded pain and scar creams for TRICARE beneficiaries to whom he never spoke and whom he never examined or treated.
Jerry Lee Hawrylak, 71, of Lake Worth, Texas, recruited Carpenter to sign the prescriptions and recruited TRICARE beneficiaries to accept the medically unnecessary creams.
From November 2014 to January 2017, Carpenter, Hawrylak and others caused a Fort Worth-based pharmacy involved in the conspiracy to fraudulently bill TRICARE, the healthcare program for U.S. service members and their families, approximately $8.5 million for these creams.
Evidence at trial included so-called standing orders signed by Carpenter that were backdated so the pharmacy could change prescriptions after the fact to maximize TRICARE reimbursement.
The prescriptions Carpenter signed and maintained in his office authorized unlimited refills and listed fake addresses for beneficiaries.
Carpenter was sentenced to 45 months in prison. Hawrylka got a 60-month sentence.
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Chris Graham
