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TRENTON
Attorney General Paula T. Dow and Criminal
Justice Director Stephen J. Taylor announced
that a North Jersey pharmacist was sentenced
today for billing the Medicaid Program for
prescriptions that were never dispensed.
According
to Acting Insurance Fraud Prosecutor Riza
Dagli, Kamal Moorjani, 40, of Lyndhurst,
a pharmacist at the Amethyst Pharmacy in
Jersey City, was sentenced to three years
in state prison by Superior Court Judge
Kevin G. Callahan in Hudson County. Moorjani
was ordered to pay $1,289 in restitution
to the Medicaid Program and $10,000 to the
Jersey City Police Department. Moorjani
also agreed to pay a $30,000 civil penalty
to Medicaid and forfeit $15,000 of the assets
seized. Moorjani’s sentence was based
on his June 25 guilty plea to an accusation
which charged him with second-degree health
care claims fraud. As a result of the plea
agreement, Moorjani’s pharmaceutical
license was suspended in June for a period
of three years.
In
pleading guilty, Moorjani admitted that
between Jan. 1, 2009 and Jan. 27, 2010,
he submitted claims to the Medicaid program
for prescription drugs allegedly dispensed
to Medicaid beneficiaries, even though the
prescription drugs were never dispensed.
The claims were subsequently paid out by
the Medicaid program.
At
the time of Moorjani’s arrest in January
2010, the Division of Criminal Justice seized
assets and property from Moorjani including
the pharmacy property at 550 Newark Avenue,
his residence in Lyndhurst, and several
bank accounts.
Today’s
sentence stemmed from Operation MedScam,
an ongoing investigation by the Office of
the Insurance Fraud Prosecutor’s Medicaid
Fraud Control Unit and the Jersey City Police
Department’s Special Investigation
Unit. Since October, more than 32 people,
including doctors and pharmacists, have
been arrested in the joint investigation,
which uncovered a criminal narcotics network
based in Hudson County that distributed
black market prescription pain pills such
as OxyContin and Percocet. The network was
obtaining fraudulent narcotics prescriptions
and filling them at various pharmacies.
At the same time, Medicaid was being billed
for phony doctor visits and prescription
medicines that were never dispensed.
The
network allegedly distributed the prescription
pain pills throughout Hudson County and
other parts of the state, including Bergen,
Ocean, Morris and Monmouth counties. A single
30 milligram OxyContin pill, known as a
"blue," typically sells for $10
to $20 on the street, while a 10 milligram
Percocet pill sells for $5 to $8.
Detective
Kevin Gannon, Sgt. Frederick Weidman and
Deputy Attorneys General Debra Conrad and
Cynthia Vazquez were assigned to the investigation.
Conrad represented the Office of the Insurance
Fraud Prosecutor at the sentencing.
They
were assisted by Medicaid Fraud Control
Unit Analyst Mitzi Gross and Anne Howell,
RN., as well as the following members of
the Jersey City Police Department’s
Special Investigation Unit under the supervision
of Chief Thomas Comey: Capt. Gary Lallo,
Sgt. Anthony Musante, Sgt. Wally Wolf, Detective
Wael Shahid, Detective Jeff Guilfoyle, Detective
Vincent Disbrow, Detective Hector Marrero,
Police Officer Alex Torres, Police Officer
Chris Dolan, and Police Officer Erik Infantes.
Deputy Attorney General Carol Stanton Meier,
Detective Sgt. Scott Naismyth and Analyst
Bethany Schussler are handling the asset
forfeiture action for the Division of Criminal
Justice.
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