Remember the multimillion prescription drug kickback scheme involving the U.S. military’s health insurer that resulted in several guilty pleas in Arkansas federal court back in 2018?
Well, a company’s name has recently surfaced in connection with the kickback scheme.
In December, an attorney for Be Well Enterprises LLC delivered a check for $62,633 to the office of Cody Hiland, the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas.
The money was traced to payments it received for kickbacks in exchange for recruiting six Tricare beneficiaries who received more than $300,000 in compounded prescription drugs, according to a civil forfeiture lawsuit filed by federal prosecutors on March 4. Tricare is the military’s health insurance program.
The federal government’s lawsuit doesn’t provide many details about Be Well’s transactions except that they occurred from “in or around April 2015 to in or around September 2015.”
The lawsuit also didn’t say who provided the kickbacks or even the name of the company’s attorney who delivered the check.
The federal government had to file a civil lawsuit for it to keep the money. The lawsuit didn’t say what prompted Be Well’s attorney to hand over the money in the first place.
No criminal charges have been filed as of Thursday in connection with Be Well’s case.
A filing with the Arkansas Secretary of State shows Be Well was incorporated on March 26, 2015 by Blake Yoder of Scott. Yoder couldn’t be reached for comment.
If you recall, several people have pleaded guilty in connection with kickbacks related to Tricare, including Brad Duke, who operated Medsurg Inc. of Little Rock.
In October 2018, he waived indictment and pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to violate the anti-kickback statute from December 2014 to July 2015. He also agreed to forfeit $1.1 million that he gained from the crime.
Duke paid five patient recruiters more than $2 million for referring more than 100 beneficiaries of Tricare, for which Tricare paid more than $10 million in prescription compounds.
“Duke’s scheme resulted in millions of dollars of fraud and waste to our taxpaying citizens,” Hiland said in a news release at the time.
Duke still has not been sentenced.
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