Arkansas
News Archive: 2009 Quick Reference: August 20, 2010 - Fayetteville Surgeon Sentenced on Health Care Fraud Charges – Read More |  |
Fayetteville Surgeon Sentenced on Health Care Fraud Charges (U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Arkansas)
Fayetteville, AR - Dr. Robert J. Tomlinson, 51, of Fayetteville, Arkansas, was sentenced in Federal Court in Fort Smith on Aug. 20, 2010, by United States District Judge Robert T. Dawson, to a ten month sentence following a guilty plea on April 2, 2010, announced Deborah Groom, United States Attorney. Tomlinson was charged by information on April 2, with health care fraud, in violation of 18 United States Code, Sections 1347(2) and 2(b). Tomlinson will serve five months of the ten month sentence in the custody of the United States Bureau of Prisons, and will serve the remaining five months in home detention with electronic monitoring.
Tomlinson, an orthopedic surgeon with practices located in Fayetteville and Rogers, Arkansas, specialized in knee and shoulder surgeries. According to pleadings in the case, Tomlinson would conduct actual surgeries on patients and bill federal insurance programs, such as Medicare, Medicaid, Tricare, along with private insurance companies, for procedures and services not performed. These claims, being false, would result in payments of higher dollar amounts than he was entitled.
In addition to the prison term, Tomlinson was ordered to pay restitution in the amount of $66,497.00, for the acts in the criminal information. He will serve a term of three years supervised release after the term of imprisonment.
The case was investigated by Special Agents of the United States Department of Health and Human Service, Office of Inspector General, and prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney, Steven Snyder.
