A Maryland man was found guilty by a federal jury of fraudulently billing Medicare for expensive respiratory testing for nursing home patients during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The individual found guilty was 42-year-old Patrick Britton-Harr of Annapolis, according to a news release issued Tuesday by the United States Department of Justice.
According to the DOJ, Britton-Harr delivered COVID-19 testing kits to nursing facilities across the country during the pandemic, as evidenced by court records and trial testimony.
However, in addition to the COVID-19 specimens gathered and billed to Medicare, Britton-Harr sought reimbursement “for separate, high-priced respiratory pathogen panel (RPP) tests purportedly conducted in a laboratory he owned in Arizona,” according to the release. RPP tests are intended to screen for more than 30 respiratory infections.
The defendant made false claims to Medicare that physicians who treated patients requested the RPP tests. However, the physicians never ordered the tests for their nursing home patients, and some testified at trial that they had never ordered an RPP test for a single patient in their entire medical careers, according to the DOJ.
According to the announcement, Britton-Harr’s company, Provista Health, illegally billed Medicare $18.7 million for RPP testing in just six months, with Medicare paying more than $7.2 million. U.S. Attorney Kelly O. Hayes for the District of Maryland criticized Mr. Britton-Harr’s decision to abuse elderly nursing home residents and inexperienced interns for personal gain amid a global pandemic. “This verdict reinforces our message: those who commit fraud will face consequences.” ” We will find you and prosecute you to the full extent of the law.”
Britton-Harr’s fraud scheme allowed him to “fund a lavish lifestyle,” including the purchase of a $112,500 Porsche 911 and monthly mortgage payments of $25,000 on a waterfront property in Annapolis, according to the DOJ.
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