Tampa Man Convicted In Nation's Largest Health Care Fraud

TAMPA, FL — A 48-year-old Tampa man will spend 6 1/2 years in prison after pleading guilty to taking part in one of the largest health care frauds in history.

On Nov. 5, U.S. District Judge Virginia M. Hernandez Covington sentenced Michael Nolan and Richard Epstein, 29, of Aurora, Colorado, for their roles in a conspiracy to defraud federal health benefit programs, Medicare and the Civilian Health and Medical Program of the Department of Veterans Affairs.

In addition to serving time, the two men were ordered to jointly pay restitution of $29,020,304.

“These significant sentences and restitution of over $29 million to our nation’s critical health care system – Medicare – are a result of law enforcement’s unified efforts to hold the perpetrators of one of the largest health care fraud schemes in history accountable for their crimes,” said Special Agent in Charge Omar Pérez Aybar of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General.

Nolan and Epstein pleaded guilty on July 31, 2020.

Following his prison sentence, Nolan will spend three years on supervised release.

Epstein was sentenced to five years and three months in federal prison, followed by three years of supervised release.

According to court documents, from October 2016 through April 2019, Epstein and Nolan ran a telemarketing company in Tampa called REMN Management LLC that targeted the elderly to generate thousands of medically unnecessary physicians’ orders for durable medical equipment and cancer genetic testing.

Epstein and Nolan also created and operated Comprehensive Telcare LLC, a telemedicine company through which they illegally bribed physicians to sign the orders regardless of medical necessity.

Epstein and Nolan then illegally sold the signed physicians’ orders to client-conspirators for use as support for false and fraudulent claims submitted to Medicare and CHAMPVA. The conspiracy resulted in the submission of at least $134 million in fraudulent claims to the federal health benefit programs with $29 million in payments.

The investigation and prosecution of the case were part of nationwide efforts known as Operation Brace Yourself and Operation Double Helix. The operations targeted schemes in which DME companies, laboratories and marketers were paying illegal bribes through “telemedicine” operators to obtain signed physicians’ orders for DME and CGx, which were then used to support fraudulent, illegal claims submitted to Medicare and other federal health benefit programs.

“We are all victims of these corrupt individuals because they cheated the taxpayer-funded Medicare system,” said FBI Tampa Division Special Agent in Charge Michael McPherson. “Health care fraud investigations are given high priority within the FBI’s Criminal Investigative Division. Because this abuse impacts us all, protection of these federal health benefit programs is a shared responsibility, which can be accomplished with the support of an engaged community willing to bring health care fraud to the attention of law enforcement.”

"The significant prison terms and financial penalties will hopefully bring some closure to those victimized by Nolan and Epstein,” said IRS Criminal Investigation Special Agent in Charge Brian Payne. “They preyed on the elderly and military veterans to subject them to unnecessary medical testing and to use unnecessary medical equipment for their own financial gain. We will continue to investigate these con artists and hold them accountable.”