U.S. Attorney Michael DiGiacomo announced that William Stephan, a 65-year-old doctor from Tonawanda, NY, was sentenced to one year of probation and 100 hours of community service after pleading guilty to misprision of felony. The sentence was handed down by U.S. District Judge Lawrence J. Vilardo.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Charles M. Kruly explained that Stephan, who runs a family practice in Tonawanda, signed prescriptions for compounded medications at the request of Erik Berg in April 2015. Over several months, Stephan signed prescriptions for 19 patients without verifying their medical needs or noting refills, resulting in over 500 refills being authorized.
These compounded medications had significant reimbursement rates averaging more than $16,000 per prescription. Health care benefit programs paid $8,750,315 for these prescriptions and refills. Pharmacy benefit managers would not have approved these reimbursements if they had known the prescriptions were pre-filled by Berg and did not address specific patient needs.
Stephan also signed prescriptions for other individuals including Scott Trapp and Michael Luehrsen. An audit conducted by Express Scripts, Inc., in June 2016 revealed discrepancies as Stephan falsely claimed to have written certain prescriptions during the audit process.
Berg and Luehrsen have been convicted and are awaiting sentencing while Trapp has already been sentenced.
The investigation was carried out by the Federal Bureau of Investigation under Acting Special Agent-in-Charge Mark Grimm’s direction.
