Dehshid “David” Nourian, a 62-year-old Texas pharmacist from Plano, has been sentenced to 17 years and six months in prison after his involvement in a massive healthcare fraud scheme. Nourian was also ordered to pay more than $115 million in restitution and forfeit $405 million in assets tied to the illegal operation.
The scheme, which defrauded the Department of Labor’s Office of Workers’ Compensation Programs (DOL-OWCP) and Blue Cross Blue Shield, totaled over $145 million. Nourian was convicted for paying doctors to prescribe medically unnecessary compound creams to injured federal workers, between May 2014 and March 2017.
The fraud involved three pharmacies owned and operated by Nourian and his co-conspirators in Fort Worth and Arlington, Texas. The pharmacies billed the DOL-OWCP for as much as $16,000 per prescription, while the cost of producing the compound creams was about $15. The unqualified staff, including teenagers, mixed these medications in the back rooms of the pharmacies.
To conceal the illegal profits, Nourian and his co-conspirators laundered the money through purported holding companies and evaded paying $24 million in federal income taxes on their illicit earnings.
In addition to the prison sentence, the court ordered the forfeiture of $395 million in brokerage accounts, more than $2 million in bank accounts, $8 million in real estate in Dallas and Austin, and a BMW luxury vehicle. This forfeiture marks the highest amount ever obtained in a health care fraud case, according to Matthew R. Galeotti, head of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division.
“This defendant was tried, convicted, and ordered to forfeit more than $400 million – the highest forfeiture ever obtained in a health care fraud case in the Department’s history,” Galeotti said. “Now his ill-gotten proceeds will be returned to the taxpayers and programs designed to care for our most vulnerable citizens.”
Nourian’s case highlights the persistent threat of healthcare fraud and underscores the commitment of the Justice Department to safeguard taxpayer funds and healthcare programs for the most vulnerable individuals.
