Westlake Man Sentenced For Defrauding Cleveland Clinic

WESTLAKE, OH — A Westlake man has been sentenced to five years in prison for conspiring to defraud the Cleveland Clinic out of $2.7 million. Wisam Rizk was also ordered to pay $2.7 million in restitution, the Department of Justice announced.

Rizk previously pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and honest services fraud, among related charged. He will be deported after his sentence is completed, the Department of Justice said.

Rizk was the chief technology officer at Interactive Visual Health Records, a company formed by Cleveland Clinic Innovations. Rizk's company was charged with developing a visual medical charting concept, the indictment against him said.

Interactive Visual's former executive director was Gary Fingerhut, who also pleaded guilty to his role in the conspiracy and was sentenced to 30 months in prison in late 2018.

Both Rizk and Fingerhut were barred from receiving any financial benefit, or having any member of their families benefit, from companies the Cleveland Clinic did business with. Exceptions to that rule needed to be approved by and disclosed to the Cleveland Clinic.

Rizk and others incorporated a shell company called iStarFZE LLC, which did not actually provide any goods or services. The company had a website and email address, along with a mailing address in New York City, to give the impression it was a working business, the indictment said.

iStar submitted a bid to the Cleveland Clinic to develop and design Interactive Visual's software and to increase the price the Clinic paid for the software design and development. The company did not disclose Rizk's financial interest, the indictment said.

Rizk paid Fingerhut a "commission" to remain quiet on the scheme. Between August 2012 and November 2014, Fingerhut reportedly accepted more than $469,000 in payments from Rizk. Over that stretch, the Clinic was defrauded out of more than $2.7 million, according to indictments against both Rizk and Fingerhut.

The FBI investigated the allegations of fraud.

In 2017, Fingerhut released a statement through his attorney J. Timothy Bender. "I apologize for the bad decisions that I made; they were wrong and I am deeply remorseful," Fingerhut said. "I hurt my family, my former employer and my community and I take complete responsibility for my actions."