Dallas Healthcare Exec Sentenced to 66 Months for Forest Park, NextHealth Frauds

A Dallas healthcare executive was sentenced Thursday afternoon to 66 months in federal prison for his role in two healthcare fraud schemes, Forest Park Medical Center and Nexthealth, and was ordered to pay $3 million in restitution, announced U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas Erin Nealy Cox.

Andrew Hillman, 43, pleaded guilty in October 2018 to conspiracy to pay and receive healthcare bribes and kickbacks – violations of the anti-kickback statute and the Travel Act – in the Forest Park scheme.

In plea papers, Mr. Hillman admitted he and his business partner, Seymon Narosov, were paid $190,000 by Forest Park to refer patients to the facility or to surgeons with privileges there. The payments, he admitted, were funneled through a shell entity, Adelaide Business Solutions, and Hillman and Narosov submitted phony invoices to conceal the wrongdoing.

The same day, Mr. Hillman also pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit money laundering in the NextHealth scheme.

He admitted that he and others conspired to launder the proceeds of various healthcare fraud offenses related to their pharmacies, resulting in $450 million in fraudulent billings to government and private insurance programs.  Among other fraudulent activities, the pharmacies paid illegal kickbacks to doctors and others to generate prescriptions, self-funded patient copays to dupe auditors, and misbranded drugs.

In April, Mr. Hillman testified about his criminal activity in the Forest Park Medical Center trial, which ended in guilty verdicts for seven of his coconspirators. In total, 18 defendants have been convicted in connection with the Forest Park matter.

Two defendants have been convicted in the Nexthealth scheme.

The cases were investigated by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management Office of Inspector General, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation, the U.S. Department of Labor Office of Inspector General, the U.S. Department of Defense - Defense Criminal Investigative Service, and the U.S. Postal Service Office of Inspector General, with assistance from the Food and Drug Administration Office of Criminal Investigations. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Andrew Wirmani, Marcus Busch, and Chad Meacham prosecuted.