Month: April 2023

Source: United States Department of Justice News

A federal jury convicted a Texas physician and clinic office manager yesterday for operating a pill-mill clinic that unlawfully prescribed over 600,000 opioid pills in exchange for cash.

According to court documents and evidence presented at trial, Dr. Oscar Lightner, 73, and Andres Martinez Jr., 29, both of Laredo, operated Jomori Health and Wellness (Jomori), a purported Houston pain management clinic, as a pill mill. Lightner, who was the owner of and physician at Jomori, unlawfully prescribed dangerous combinations of controlled substances including hydrocodone, carisoprodol, and alprazolam to his patients without a legitimate medical purpose, in exchange for cash payments ranging from $250 to $500 per patient. Martinez, who was Jomori’s office manager and Lightner’s stepson, coordinated with “crew leaders” to bring multiple people – including individuals living in homeless shelters – into Jomori to pose as patients. Jomori received over $1.2 million in cash over fourteen months through its scheme that resulted in the unlawful distribution and dispensing of over 600,000 Schedule II opioids – including hydrocodone – and other controlled substances.

Lightner was convicted of one count of conspiracy to distribute and dispense controlled substances and two counts of unlawfully distributing and dispensing controlled substances. Martinez was convicted of one count of conspiracy to distribute and dispense controlled substances and one count of unlawfully distributing and dispensing controlled substances. Lightner and Martinez face a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison on each count and are both are scheduled to be sentenced on Aug. 8. A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.

Assistant Attorney General Kenneth A. Polite, Jr. of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, U.S. Attorney Alamdar S. Hamdani for the Southern District of Texas, and Special Agent in Charge Daniel C. Comeaux of the DEA made the announcement.

The DEA investigated the case.

Trial Attorneys Monica Cooper and Andrew Tamayo of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section are prosecuting the case.

The Fraud Section leads the Criminal Division’s efforts to combat health care fraud through the Health Care Fraud Strike Force Program. Since March 2007, this program, comprised of 15 strike forces operating in 25 federal districts, has charged more than 5,000 defendants who collectively have billed federal health care programs and private insurers more than $24 billion. In addition, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, working in conjunction with the Office of the Inspector General for the Department of Health and Human Services, are taking steps to hold providers accountable for their involvement in health care fraud schemes. More information can be found at https://www.justice.gov/criminal-fraud/health-care-fraud-unit.

Source: United States Department of Justice News

            WASHINGTON – Michael Drummond, 26, of Washington, D.C., was sentenced today in two felony matters by the Honorable Sean Staples to a combined 100 months in prison for shooting at two women in Southeast D.C. in June 2021, and subsequently possessing a “ghost gun” in July 2021, announced U.S. Attorney Matthew M. Graves and Chief Robert J. Contee III, of the Metropolitan Police Department. A jury found Drummond guilty on February 10, 2023, of two counts of assault with a dangerous weapon, two counts of possession of a firearm during a crime of violence, two counts of unlawful possession of a firearm, and related firearms offenses.

            According to the government’s evidence, on June 27, 2021, Drummond, a convicted felon who was on both supervised release for a 2020 federal gun and drug conviction and on pretrial release in a pending Superior Court case, shot at two women after having an angry exchange of words with them moments earlier. One bullet slammed into a car door, lodging itself in the rolled-down window inches away from the woman sitting in the front passenger seat. A month later, officers executed a search warrant at Mr. Drummond’s home and found a loaded ghost gun under his mattress.

            In announcing the sentence, U.S. Attorney Graves and Chief Contee commended the work of those who investigated the case from the Metropolitan Police Department. They also acknowledged the efforts of those who provided assistance in the U.S. Attorney’s Office, including Kimberly Nielsen, Deputy Chief of the Major Crimes Section, Paralegal Specialists Crystal Waddy and Debra McPherson, Litigation Technology Supervisor Leif Hickling, and Litigation Technology Specialist William Henderson.  Finally, they commended the work of Assistant U.S. Attorneys Noah Simmons and Colin Cloherty, who prosecuted and tried the case, and Assistant U.S. Attorney Kathleen Gibbons, who initially investigated and indicted the case.

Source: United States Department of Justice News

PROVIDENCE, R.I. –  A Providence man found to be in possession of more than 500 grams of cocaine and 100 fentanyl pills, and who, as a previously convicted felon, was illegally in possession of several magazines of ammunition that he was legally prohibited from possessing, was sentenced today to twenty-six months in federal prison, announced United States Attorney Zachary A. Cunha.

Henry Arnaut, 27, pleaded guilty on February 8, 2022, to possession with intent to distribute 500 grams or more of cocaine; possession with intent to distribute fentanyl; and possession of ammunition by a person convicted of a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year.

In November 2020, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service (USPIS), with the assistance of the FBI’s Rhode Island Safe Streets Gang Task Force, began a Project Safe Neighborhoods Investigation into the shipment of packages to Arnuat’s residence. A search warrant was obtained for a suspicious package addressed to Arnaut and it was found to contain a significant quantity of cocaine. Arnaut was arrested on February 8, 2021, shortly after claiming the package at the U.S. Post Office. A court-authorized search of Arnaut’s residence that day resulted in the seizure of an additional quantity cocaine, approximately 100 fentanyl pills, $1,180 in cash, several  magazines, and ammunition.

The total amount of cocaine seized from the package and from Arnaut’s residence exceeded 500 grams. Arnaut, previously convicted of a felony and sentenced to a term exceeding one year, was legally prohibited from possessing ammunition.

U.S. District Court Chief Judge John J. McConnell, Jr., today sentenced Arnaut to twenty-six months of incarceration to be followed by three years of federal supervised release.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Stacey A. Erickson.

This case was investigated and prosecuted as part of the joint federal, state, and local Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN) Program, the centerpiece of the Department of Justice’s violent crime reduction efforts.  PSN is an evidence-based program proven to be effective at reducing violent crime.  Through PSN, a broad spectrum of stakeholders work together to identify the most pressing violent crime problems in the community and develop comprehensive solutions to address them.  As part of this strategy, PSN focuses enforcement efforts on the most violent offenders and partners with locally based prevention and reentry programs for lasting reductions in crime.

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Source: United States Department of Justice News

Damian Williams, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced a voluntary compliance agreement under Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”) with the City University of New York (“CUNY”) pursuant to which CUNY will provide individual relief to a student with visual impairments who was excluded from full participation in their academic courses and implement systemwide policies to ensure future compliance with the ADA across CUNY’s 25 colleges in the five boroughs of New York City, which collectively serve 243,000 students.

U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said: “It is simply unacceptable that any student should be denied equal access to an education because of a disability.  We are pleased that CUNY has agreed to provide relief to the student whose education was compromised and that CUNY is committed to improving the accessibility of its courses, including online and digital content, for all future students.”  

Title II of the ADA prohibits public entities from discriminating against any individual on the basis of disability by excluding the individual from participation in services, programs, and activities.  The ADA requires public entities to make reasonable modifications to avoid such discrimination and to administer their services, programs, and activities in the most integrated setting appropriate to the needs of qualified individuals with disabilities, including by furnishing appropriate auxiliary aids and services to ensure effective communication. 

The out-of-court agreement resolves an investigation during which the U.S. Attorney’s Office determined that CUNY failed to provide reasonable accommodations required under the ADA for a student with visual impairments at CUNY’s John Jay School of Criminal Justice and identified shortcomings in CUNY’s accessibility and reasonable accommodation policies and procedures.  Specifically, the investigation found, among other things, that CUNY failed to make qualified learning assistants available to ensure an integrated learning setting for the student in numerous science and mathematics courses.  Additionally, John Jay instructors required students to use WebAssign, a third-party online learning product, to complete assignments, but that digital platform was not fully capable of reading out mathematical and scientific symbols and equations.  Furthermore, John Jay repeatedly failed to make usable versions of required textbooks and other course materials available to the student by the start of courses.  The student made a number of attempts to bring the deficiencies to the attention of staff at John Jay and CUNY, but neither John Jay nor CUNY had adequate policies and procedures to ensure that reasonable accommodation requests and related complaints are addressed in a timely and appropriate manner.  As a result, the student received unduly poor grades and was forced to forgo taking other desired and required advanced courses for a number of academic years.        

CUNY has agreed to prepare and implement systemwide policies to ensure improved accessibility of educational content to visually impaired students, including digital learning content, proper training of staff and faculty, and effective reasonable accommodation and complaint procedures.   

Under the agreement, CUNY will permanently purge all of the affected student’s grades in the relevant courses in which reasonable modifications were not provided and pay the student $10,000 in compensatory damages.  CUNY will also adopt systemwide policies and procedures to ensure:

• The prompt availability of qualified learning assistants, including by initiating an appropriate and timely search process, involving the relevant affected students in that process, and setting a reasonable level of compensation likely to attract qualified candidates;   
• The prompt availability of accessible course materials by the start of the relevant course or as soon as practicable based upon early consultations with affected students;
• Reasonable accommodation and complaint mechanisms based on clear, short deadlines by which accommodation requests and complaints must be addressed and remaining concerns are promptly escalated to higher-level administrators as necessary;
• Information Technology accessibility consistent with the latest Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, including via verification of the accessibility of third-party learning products and of instructors’ awareness of accessibility requirements for instructor-created content; and
• Training of faculty and accessibility-services staff on ADA requirements.  

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This case is being handled by the Office’s Civil Rights Unit in the Civil Division.  Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Cha-Kim is in charge of the case.

Source: United States Department of Justice News

The Justice Department announced today that Danco Laboratories, LLC (Danco), located in New York, has agreed to pay $765,000 to resolve allegations that it violated the False Claims Act by failing to pay certain customs duties, known as marking duties, on imported pharmaceutical products that lacked markings to identify their country of origin.

The Tariff Act of 1930 requires companies that import foreign products into the United States to mark the country of origin on those products. Importers that fail to mark their products are subject to a 10% ad valorem duty. The settlement resolves allegations that, during the period 2011 through 2019, Danco failed to mark imported pharmaceutical products with the appropriate country of origin, and thereafter violated the False Claims Act by knowingly avoiding the marking duties owed to the United States for those imports.   

“The False Claims Act protects the public fisc by imposing liability not only on those who knowingly submit false claims to the United States, but also on those who knowingly avoid obligations owed to the United States,” said Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Brian M. Boynton, head of the Justice Department’s Civil Division. “This settlement demonstrates the department’s commitment to ensure that importers properly pay all amounts due under our customs laws.”

“Our office is committed to ensuring that importers are transparent with consumers and comply with customs laws and the False Claims Act,” said U.S. Attorney Brit Featherston. “We will continue to pursue aggressively those who seek to avoid their duties and obligations under the law.”   

“The United States has required imported goods to be marked with their country of origin for generations, so American consumers can use that information in their purchasing decisions,” said Director Frank Russo of the U.S. Customs and Broder Protection (CPB) New York Field Office. “CBP takes the marking laws very seriously, and is pleased to work with our partners to ensure importers adhere to all customs laws.”

The civil settlement includes the resolution of claims brought by the Life Legal Defense Foundation under the qui tam or whistleblower provisions of the False Claims. These provisions allow a private party, known as a relator, to file an action on behalf of the United States and receive a portion of any recovery. The qui tam action is captioned U.S. ex rel. Life Legal Defense Foundation v. ASD Specialty Healthcare, LLC, et al., No. 21-cv-0088 (E.D. Tex.). As part of today’s resolution, the whistleblowers will receive approximately $115,000. 

The resolution obtained in this matter was the result of a coordinated effort between the Justice Department’s Civil Division, Commercial Litigation Branch, Fraud Section, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Texas with assistance from CPB.

The matter was handled by Trial Attorney Daniel W. Kastner of the Justice Department’s Civil Division and Assistant U.S. Attorneys James Gillingham and Adrian Garcia for the Eastern District of Texas.

The claims resolved by the settlement are allegations only, and there has been no determination of liability.