A federal jury found a Florida healthcare worker guilty of defrauding the state of over $11 million in Medicare funds.
Christian Cruz faces up to 125 years in prison after he was convicted of running a medical equipment supplier operation in which he shipped orthotic braces to Medicare beneficiaries nationwide, including those “who neither requested nor required the braces,” and then submitted false claims to receive payment from the government, according to federal prosecutors.
The FBI and the Department of Health and Human Services’s inspector general’s office led the investigation into Cruz, who was convicted on nine charges, including conspiracy to commit healthcare fraud and conspiracy to defraud the United States.
“Healthcare fraud is not a paperwork offense—it is a crime that steals from seniors and undermines confidence in our healthcare system,” U.S. Attorney Jason A. Reding Quiñones for the Southern District of Florida said in a statement announcing Cruz’s conviction on Thursday.
“The jury’s verdict makes clear that medical professionals who abuse their positions of trust for personal gain will face serious consequences,” Quiñones said.
The Fort Lauderdale nursing assistant faked doctors’ orders for the braces through illegal kickbacks, allowing his operation to rake in $11.4 million, authorities said.
Cruz and his colleague, Jorge Luis Almansa, paid “marketers,” who used telemedicine companies to get the orders without the prescribing doctor ever seeing the patient, and in some cases, used “the electronic signature of a beneficiary’s own doctor without that doctor’s permission,” according to prosecutors.
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Investigators said Cruz lied about being the sole owner of the company, hiding that he co-owned the enterprise with Almansa, a convicted felon. Almansa remains at large.
“Medicare would not have allowed the company to enroll with Medicare if it had known about Cruz’s co-conspirator, a fact that would have barred Medicare enrollment,” the Department of Justice said.
