A Fredericksburg, Texas, physician is on trial in federal court in Dallas for taking part in a nationwide conspiracy to bilk Medicare out of more than $39 million by prescribing unnecessary orthotic devices and genetic tests for thousands of patients he never met.
The trial of Dr. David M. Young began Tuesday before U.S. District Judge Brantley Starr. Young is accused in a June 2023 grand jury indictment of conspiracy to commit healthcare fraud and making false statements relating to healthcare matters.
Judge Starr told the 14 jurors and alternates chosen Tuesday that the trial is expected to take about two weeks.
Lawyers for Young said repeatedly that he will testify in his own defense.
One of his lawyers, S. Michael McColloch of Dallas, said in his opening statement that Young, whom he described as “a dedicated small-town physician,” was a victim of “crooks” behind a “horrendous conspiracy” who lied to the doctor when they sent him thousands of patient charts and asked him to evaluate the need to prescribe for those patients orthotic devices, such as knee, ankle and back braces, as well as costly lab tests to determine, among other things, if patients had genetic mutations that could indicate a high risk of developing certain cancers.
“We don’t dispute that there was an audacious, colossal fraud,” McColloch told the jurors. But Young’s only fault, he said, was being “too trusting” and “naïve” when he agreed to work with a group of Florida-based companies that purported to provide telemedicine services to patients.
The government, he said, built its case against Young on the word of others who have pleaded guilty to federal crimes and agreed to testify against the doctor in exchange for relative leniency.
“They have to rely on criminals to make their case,” the lawyer said.
According to federal court records from the Southern District of Florida, Steven Kahn, identified in Young’s indictment as the co-owner of several of the Florida business entities in question, pleaded guilty in March 2021 to one count of conspiracy to commit healthcare fraud and wire fraud and was sentenced to 11 years in prison to be followed by three years of supervised release. He was also ordered to pay more than $21.2 million in restitution.
Kahn is not listed as a potential government witness in Young’s trial, but a co-defendant in Kahn’s Florida criminal case, Pamela Edwin, is, as are others identified in Young’s indictment as “his co-conspirators.”
In all, the indictment said, Medicare was billed about $39.6 million for “false and fraudulent claims” for orthotic braces and genetic tests, of which the government healthcare program paid about $13.9 million.
Prosecutor Ethan Womble, of the fraud section of the U.S. Department of Justice’s criminal division in Dallas, said Young was a willing, knowing participant in the fraud conspiracy.
The Fredericksburg physician, Womble said, helped his co-conspirators “prey upon thousands of patients,” for many of whom he prescribed orthotics and tests without ever having treated or even met them.
“These people were strangers to him,” Womble said. Young would sometimes order more than 100 prescriptions a day electronically, for far more patients than he could possibly have seen.
“Why did Dr. Young do it?” the prosecutor said. “One reason — money. … For every click of his mouse, he got paid. And Dr. Young did this a lot.”
According to his indictment, Young was paid $30 to $50 for each telemedicine “consultation” he performed. Womble told jurors the doctor pocketed $475,000 over a two-year period. “He signed prescriptions while he was on vacation,” Womble said.
In addition to McColloch, Young is represented by Karen Cook of Dallas, Michael E. Clark of the Houston office of Womble Bond Dickinson, and Stephen Chahn Lee of Chicago.
In addition to Ethan Womble, the government is represented by, among others, Brynn Schiess of the DOJ fraud section in Dallas.
The case number in the Northern District of Texas is 3:21-cr-00417