The United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Vermont stated that on May 13, 2024, Steven Mack, 49, of Bridgeville, Pennsylvania was sentenced by United States District Judge William K. Sessions III to a one-year term of probation and ordered to pay a $20,000 fine and perform community service. Mack previously pleaded guilty to attempting to obstruct a federal grand jury’s investigation into an illegal kickback that Purdue Pharma LP paid to Mack’s former employer, Practice Fusion, an electronic medical records company. According to court records, while working at Practice Fusion, Mack contributed to his employer’s successful efforts to persuade Purdue Pharma L.P. to pay Practice Fusion almost one million dollars in exchange for Practice Fusion altering its physician-facing user interface to generate more opioid prescriptions. In 2020, Purdue Pharma LP entered a plea of guilty relating to this arrangement in the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey, and Practice Fusion accepted responsibility for its role pursuant to a deferred prosecution agreement filed in United States District Court for the District of Vermont in case number 2:20-cr-11-wks. Pursuant to that agreement, Practice Fusion agreed to pay a criminal fine of more than $25 million.
In late 2019, knowing that the United States Department of Justice was investigating this illegal kickback scheme, Mack intentionally deleted from his employer-issued computer documents that were relevant to the government’s investigation. In recognition of the underlying opioid-promoting kickback scheme, Judge Sessions ordered as a condition of probation that Mack perform 40 hours of community service arranged by a probation officer and involving services for persons suffering from drug addiction. As part of his plea agreement Mack agreed to cooperate with law enforcement and to provide truthful testimony. Because of Mack’s cooperation, the United States recommended that Mack receive a non-incarcerative sentence.
