6 pharmacy owners charged in $14M kickback scheme

Six Dallas-area pharmacy owners and marketers were charged in connection with a kickback scheme involving compound drug claims to Tricare and the U.S. Department of Labor.

In a May 13 news release, the Department of Justice alleged that $14 million in illegal kickbacks and bribes were paid after physicians prescribed compounded drugs covered by federal insurance. 

The pharmacy owners oversaw two pharmacies, Rxpress and Xpress, that shared the same staff and operated out of the same building. The indictment alleges that both companies used the same marketers but paid them differently, depending on if they received a commission on a federal or private prescription, to disguise their illegal activities.

This superseding indictment comes after an initial indictment filed in the Northern District of Texas in December 2018.

The superseding indictment includes the following charges:

• conspiracy to defraud the United States and pay and receive kickbacks
  
  
• paying and/or receiving kickbacks
  
  
• conspiracy to commit money laundering by concealing proceeds of the unlawful kickbacks
  
  
• conspiracy to commit money laundering by engaging in monetary transactions in criminally derived property
  
  
• engaging in monetary transactions in criminally derived property

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