Michigan pharmacy tech pleads guilty in $5.6 million healthcare fraud scheme
A former pharmacy technician working in Metro Detroit pleaded guilty to federal charges related to a $5.6 million scheme to defraud health care insurance programs.
Ali Naserdean, 32, of Dearborn Heights, entered his plea on Thursday to one charge each of conspiracy to commit health care fraud and possession with intent to illegally distribute oxycodone, according to the U.S. Attorney's office for the Eastern District of Michigan.
He will be sentenced on Sept. 1 and faces up to 20 years in prison.
Naserdean had worked as a pharmacy technician at three pharmacies in Metro Detroit, the district attorney's office said. Between 2019 and 2020, Naserdean and his co-conspirator submitted what prosecutors said were false and fraudulent claims for payment toward prescription drugs that were not ordered by a doctor and not distributed to a patient.
Forged prescriptions were used to hide the activity, during which a patient never saw the listed doctor and the medication was not prescribed.
The scheme resulted in over $5.6 million in losses to Medicare, Medicaid and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan, prosecutors said.
"Additionally, from 2019 through 2022, Naserdean provided unlawful prescriptions of oxycodone to drug traffickers in exchange for cash, without regard to whether the prescriptions were actually prescribed by physicians or dispensed in good faith," the prosecutor said.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation Detroit Field Office, Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General, the Dearborn Police Department, and the Department of Justice Criminal Division Fraud Section worked on the investigation.
