Doctor pleads guilty in kickback scheme involving pain creams
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A Lake Charles, Louisiana, physician pleaded guilty Friday to federal fraud charges stemming from a profit-splitting arrangement with a company selling topical creams and patches to injured workers, the U.S. Department of Justice said.
Dr. Robert Dale Bernauer’s involvement in the six-year scheme to defraud the U.S. government and private insurance companies by over-billing for unnecessary medications provided to workers compensation patients netted him more than $1 million in profits, according to the department.
Court documents say individuals associated with the unnamed drug company recruited Dr. Bernauer to dispense pain creams and patches to his workers comp patients by offering him a 50% split of the profits collected from insurers.
The company then acted as the billing agent for Dr. Bernauer, handling the fraudulent claims submitted to the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Workers’ Compensation Programs, which covers federal employees, and to private insurers.
The company billed insurers at markups of 15 to 20 times what the medications actually cost, according to investigators.
Dr. Bernauer admitted that both he and his co-conspirators knew he did not have a license to dispense medications from his clinic but signed two contracts under which he agreed to buy topical medications at set rates and dispense them exclusively to his workers comp patients, according to the DOJ. In his plea agreement, Dr. Bernauer agreed to pay nearly $1 million to several entities, including the Department of Labor, the court clerk’s office, and insurers affected by the scheme. He could be subject to another $1 million in restitution as “a shared obligation with any of his co-conspirators who are later convicted,” the DOJ said.
He also faces a potential prison sentence of up to five years, according to the department.
