Sex Cult Doc Can’t Get License Back; Lap-Band Doc Gets 7 Years; Cancer Misdiagnosis?

Danielle Roberts, DO, the doctor who lost her medical license in 2020 for allegedly branding women in the NXIVM sex cult, was denied her appeal to have her license reinstated. (WTEN News 10)

California doctor Julian Omidi, MD, who ran a Lap-Band surgery business called 1-800-GET-THIN, was sentenced to 7 years in federal prison for health insurance fraud. Prosecutors charged that insurers authorized payments for some surgeries based on falsified sleep studies and other false information, including patients’ weights. (KTLA5)

A patient sued Ryan Cole, MD, for allegedly misdiagnosing her with endometrial cancer. Cole has been a vocal opponent of COVID-19 vaccines. (Idaho Capital Sun)

A U.K. coroner ruled that Stephen Wright, PhD, a 32-year-old clinical psychologist, died from a rare reaction to the AstraZeneca COVID vaccine when it was first on the market. At that time, the potential rare complication of thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome was not known. (The Guardian)

William Husel, DO, the Ohio doctor who was acquitted in the deaths of 14 patients given opioids, sued Trinity Health, alleging malicious prosecution. (CBS Detroit)

Iowa physician Amanda Moreno, DO, has sued her former employer alleging that administrators discriminated against employees who didn’t share their religious views and encouraged them to vote for former president Donald Trump. (Iowa Capital Dispatch)

Connie Sneed, LPN, an Indiana nurse accused of removing a COVID patient’s oxygen at a nursing home, pleaded guilty to a felony but won’t serve jail time. (Indy Star)

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) announced criminal charges against 18 defendants — including medical professionals and owners of medical businesses — involved in a variety of healthcare fraud schemes that allegedly resulted in over $490 million in COVID-related false billings to federal programs and theft from federally funded pandemic programs.

Arkansas physician Joe David May, MD, was sentenced to 102 months in prison for his role in a scheme to sign off on prescriptions for compounded drugs for patients he didn’t know and never treated, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Arkansas.

Children’s Mercy Hospital in Kansas City, Missouri, sued the state’s attorney general over his office’s requests for documents in an investigation into its transgender care services. (KSHB)

Meharry Medical College will pay $100,749 to resolve allegations that it submitted fraudulent claims to Medicare seeking payment for physician services that were actually performed by unsupervised residents, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Tennessee.

A former physician assistant (PA) will serve a second term in prison, this time for posing as a licensed healthcare professional, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia. Theresa Pickering served a prison sentence for a 2015 fraud and narcotics case. Now she’ll spend 2 years and 9 months in prison, followed by 3 years of supervised release.

Johns Hopkins’ Sibley Hospital will pay $5 million to resolve claims that it improperly billed Medicare for services referred by 10 cardiologists that Sibley was paying above fair market value, according to the DOJ.