Philip Esformes, the Miami Beach healthcare mogul sentenced to 20 years in a massive Medicare fraud case, must pay more than $44 million to the taxpayer-funded program and U.S. government, a federal judge decided Thursday.
Esformes, found guilty of various bribery, kickback and money-laundering charges, was ordered to reimburse $5 million in losses incurred by the Medicare system and pay about $39 million in a forfeiture judgment to the U.S. government as punishment for his crime. He also must pay an additional $617,000 for the government’s cost of his incarceration.
Justice Department prosecutors urged U.S. District Judge Robert Scola to make Esformes pay dearly with his deep pockets, proposing $207 million in restitution to Medicare. But Scola opted to go with a “conservative” loss to the government’s health insurance program based on evidence at the executive’s trial in April.
The judge, however, agreed with the prosecutors’ forfeiture proposal. “I gave him a lesser number of years in prison in anticipation of a significant financial penalty,” Scola said in Miami federal court.
Source: Miami Healthcare Mogul Must Pay $44M To Medicare, U.S. Government / insurancenewsnet.com