Just two months after being charged, all 11 defendants implicated in the $300 million Spectrum/Reliable healthcare fraud have pleaded guilty. Ten defendants, including two medical doctors, were indicted February 9. An eleventh defendant was charged on March 16. Six of the original ten defendants — Laredo-based internal medicine doctor Eduardo Canova, family medicine doctor Jose Maldonado, nurse practitioner Keith Wichinski, Reliable Labs cofounder Abraham Phillips, marketing firm owner Juan David Rojas, and marketing employee Laura Ortiz — filed plea papers on February 11, just two days after being indicted. The final defendant — Reliable Labs cofounder Biby Kurian — filed plea papers on April 6 and entered her plea on April 13.
According to court documents, the founders of several lab companies, including Unified Laboratory Services, Spectrum Diagnostic Laboratory, and Reliable Labs LLC, paid kickbacks to induce medical professionals to order medically unnecessary lab tests, which they then billed to Medicare and other federal healthcare programs. The medical professionals — including Dr. Canova, Dr. Maldonado, and Mr. Wichinski — accepted the bribes and ordered millions of dollars’ worth of tests. Meanwhile, Unified, Spectrum, and Reliable disguised the kickbacks as legitimate business transactions, including as medical advisor agreement payments, salary offsets, lease payments, and marketing commissions.
