State recoups $1.5M in pharmacy scam
By JOHN GOLDEN

On his recent swing through Westchester County, state Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo announced the recovery of $1.5 million in public funds stolen by a Westchester pharmacist in a long-running insurance-fraud scheme.

Following an investigation by the attorney general’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit, the Tarrytown Police Department and the county district attorney’s office, Neil Norwood, the former owner of pharmacies in Sleepy Hollow and Tarrytown, was convicted of first-degree grand larceny and sentenced in April to two to six years in prison.

Evidence seized from Norwood’s computers showed he had fraudulently billed for prescriptions and made cheating Medicaid, the state’s Elderly Pharmaceutical Insurance Coverage Program (EPIC) and private insurers an everyday business practice. Investigators said he used a computer code system to manage how much customers’ prescriptions were to be shorted. When an order was entered into the pharmacy’s computer, a code would come up on the screen instructing Norwood’s employees how to short the customer’s order, yet Norwood regularly billed for the full amount.

He was ordered to pay $3 million in restitution, including more than $1.3 million to Medicaid and $223,000 to EPIC. Private insurers Oxford and Cigna, who also contributed to the investigation and business audits, received $1.3 million and $110,000, respectively.

Cuomo joined Westchester County District Attorney Janet DiFiore to announce the recovery. “The return of this $1.5 million stolen from New York taxpayers is an excellent example of why I have made partnering with district attorneys and local law enforcement officials a priority in my administration,” he said. “By working together and playing to our strengths, we can stop the criminals who drive up the cost of Medicaid and selfishly burden the taxpayers of Westchester and across the state.”

“For a period of almost five years, the defendant, the local neighborhood pharmacist, defrauded both public and private insurance providers and walked all over the public trust that is implicit in his profession,” DiFiore said. “The costs of health care can be onerous enough without someone looking to enrich himself at the public’s expense.”

 

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