According to a report by NBC6, a mother and son, both residents of Miami, pleaded guilty to being part of a conspiracy that defrauded Medicare of $16 million.
According to a Justice Department spokesperson, Niurka Fernandez, 54, and Roberto Alvarez, 29, pleaded guilty to defrauding the health care program.
Authorities say Fernandez, owner of Calan Pharmacy & Discount Service and Best Pharmacy, two Miami-Dade County pharmacies, orchestrated the scheme that paid Medicare patients and patient recruiters for unnecessary prescriptions.
According to authorities, Fernandez admitted that he sent invoices to Medicare for a host of medications that were never delivered to patients.
For his part, Alvarez claimed that he worked at Best Pharmacy as a pharmacy technician, facilitated kickback payments to Medicare patients, and wrote checks to money launderers to obtain cash to pay the kickbacks.
Medicare made more than $16 million in payments to Calan Pharmacy and Best Pharmacy as a result of the scam.
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