A Florida man pleaded guilty to conspiring to bill Medicare for medically unnecessary prescriptions, Senior Counsel Philip Lamparello announced. Eric Van Vleet, 30, of Delray Beach, Florida, pleaded guilty to a superseding information charging him with conspiracy to commit healthcare fraud and conspiracy to violate the federal Anti-Kickback Statute. According to documents filed in this case and statements made in court: From February 2018 to September 2019, Van Vleet operated Hype Med LLC, which generated medically unnecessary prescriptions through a telemarketing and telemedicine scheme. As part of the healthcare fraud and kickback conspiracy, Van Vleet and Hype Med identified Medicare beneficiaries to target for expensive drugs. Call center employees contacted beneficiaries to pressure them to agree to try expensive medications, such as pain creams, scar creams, eczema creams, migraine medication, and a combination of prescription medications to be used as a “foot soak.”
Van Vleet and Hype Med then sent recordings of calls with the beneficiaries, along with pre-marked prescription pads for particular drugs that would yield exorbitant reimbursements, to telemedicine companies. Hype Med paid the telemedicine companies kickbacks for every beneficiary referred for a prescription, and the telemedicine companies paid doctors to approve the prescriptions. Van Vleet then directed the prescriptions to pharmacies, including Apogee Bio-Pharm LLC, located in Edison, New Jersey, with which Hype Med had a kickback arrangement. As a result of medically unnecessary prescriptions generated by Hype Med, Medicare paid at least $1,399,812.52 based on false and fraudulent claims.