Source: United States Department of Justice Criminal Division
The United States has filed a complaint under the False Claims Act against Jay Johnson, the former Chief Operating Officer and Chief Executive Officer of the Atlanta-based clinical laboratory Capstone Diagnostics, LLC (“Capstone”); Austin Whiles, Capstone’s former Chief Sales Officer and Vice President of Business Development; and associated entities. The complaint alleges that the defendants caused Medicare to pay approximately $13.7 million for genetic and respiratory pathogen panel testing that was not medically necessary. Johnson also faces criminal health care and wire fraud charges arising from the scheme, which allegedly exploited church health fairs, religious conferences, and senior living communities to generate testing volume, including by paying kickbacks to conference organizers and independent marketers.