Bruce Tomaso

Bruce Tomaso spent more than 30 years as a writer and editor at The Dallas Morning News. When asked what positions he held there, he usually says it’s easier to list those he didn’t.

As enterprise editor on The News’s breaking news desk in the summer of 2016, he played a key role in covering the downtown shooting spree that left five police officers dead. For its coverage, The News was a finalist for the 2017 Pulitzer Prize in Breaking News Reporting.

He spent most of 1997 in Denver covering the federal criminal trials of Oklahoma City bombers Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols. Four years later, he covered McVeigh’s execution.

His first major reporting assignment for The Texas Lawbook was a retrospective on the 20th anniversary of the $119.6 million verdict for 10 young men who’d been molested as children by Rudy Kos, a priest in the Catholic Diocese of Dallas. The stories earned Bruce and his Lawbook editor, Allen Pusey, the Dallas Bar Association’s 2018 Stephen Philbin Award for Feature Writing.

In 2019, he covered the seven-week medical fraud trial of nine physicians, healthcare executives and others associated with Forest Park Medical Center, a now-defunct Dallas surgical hospital.

He’s a member of the Alumni Hall of Fame at Arizona State University’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication. He and his wife, Dallas attorney Patricia A. Nolan, have one grown son, who is smarter than either of them.

He will drop everything, including preposterous sums of money, to see Lady Gaga, Notre Dame football, or the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team.

You can reach Bruce at bruce.tomaso@texaslawbook.net.

Forest Park Fraud Prosecutor: ‘It Comes Down to Greed and Arrogance’

Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Wirmani has never spoken publicly about the unprecedented federal criminal charges he brought against 21 Forest Park Medical Center officials, including nine surgeons and doctors.

Until now.

In an exclusive in-depth interview with Texas Lawbook reporter Bruce Tomaso, Wirmani discusses the tips that launched the investigation, the innovative legal strategy he and his team employed, and how the Forest Park prosecution success is being replicated in other jurisdictions.

April 5, 2021 Bruce Tomaso

Former Partner Sues Polsinelli for Sexual Orientation Discrimination

A Houston bankruptcy lawyer has sued his former employer, Polsinelli, alleging that he was fired because he’s gay. The plaintiff is being represented by Bill Brewer III and Bill Brewer IV.

March 31, 2021 Bruce Tomaso

Kirkland and Weil Litigate Through a Classic Case of Afflictio Duplex

For a year, Bankruptcy Court in Houston has been the setting for A Tale of Two Calamities. A raging disease and a crippled economy tugged the court in two directions. Wave after wave of businesses sought haven from creditors. Covid-19 rendered the court uninhabitable, but also made it indispensable. A flood of cases and no courtrooms in which to try them. Along came two trial lawyers from the two most competitive law firms in the corporate bankruptcy space. This is their story.

March 24, 2021 Bruce Tomaso

Hospice CEO Pleads Guilty in $60M Fraud, Cooperates Against Co-conspirators

The CEO of a onetime thriving North Texas hospice-care agency has pleaded guilty to his role in a $60 million Medicare and Medicaid fraud – and he’s not alone.

March 23, 2021 Bruce Tomaso

FCA Suit Alleges Dallas Doctor and Clinic Made $4.2M in Bad Claims

The civil False Claims Act complaint alleges the Dallas dermatopathologist and his clinic falsely billed the government for medically unnecessary tests through TRICARE.

March 23, 2021 Bruce Tomaso

Final Sentencing in Forest Park Fraud Case

The sentencing of 14 defendants convicted in the Forest Park Medical Center bribery scam have finally been sentenced to a combined 74+ years in federal prison. The last to be sentenced was Alan Beauchamp, the architect, builder and marketer of the fraud. The Lawbook’s Bruce Tomaso was there for the end of a three day marathon of reckoning in one of the most substantial and prominent medical frauds in Dallas history.

March 19, 2021 Bruce Tomaso

Four More Doctors Get Prison Time as FPMC Sentencing Continues

“Crime does not pay, even when millions are involved.”

With those words, U.S. District Judge Jack Zouhary sentenced Douglas Won, once a wealthy, preeminent spinal surgeon, to five years in federal prison for his role in a massive bribery and kickback scheme involving Forest Park Medical Center, a now-defunct physician-owned hospital in North Dallas. The judge also sent Won’s onetime business partner, surgeon Michael Rimlawi, to prison.

March 18, 2021 Bruce Tomaso

Federal Judge to Forest Park Medical Defendants: Change Scrubs to Stripes

A federal judge Wednesday sentenced Mac Burt, a founder and top administrator of Forest Park Medical Center, and surgeon Shawn Henry to several years in prison and ordered them to pay millions of dollars in restitution for their role in a $40 million fraud and kickback scheme. A nurse was hit with a three year prison term. Four more doctors will be sentenced Thursday. The Texas Lawbook’s Bruce Tomaso was in federal court in Dallas all day and has an in-depth report.

March 17, 2021 Bruce Tomaso

Forest Park Surgeons, Executives Face Prison Time Today

Six surgeons, a chiropractor and five hospital administrators from the now defunct Forest Park Medical Center fraud case – including seven who were found guilty at a lengthy trial nearly two years ago – are back in federal court today to learn how much time they could spend in prison. The Forest Park case exposed a vast bribery and kickback conspiracy involving prominent Texas surgeons and a luxurious physician-owned hospital. The Texas Lawbook is in the courtroom and will provide updates.

March 17, 2021 Bruce Tomaso

Six Charged in Frequent Flyer Hacking Scam

North Texas federal prosecutors have charged six men in a scheme that marketed airline travel booked with hacked frequent flier miles. Bruce Tomaso explains.

December 14, 2020 Bruce Tomaso