Bangladeshi man sentenced to 15 years in prison in USA

A Bangladeshi man has been sentenced by a Michigan federal court to 15 years in prison in the United States for embezzling $132 million dollar in healthcare fraud and embezzlement in the name of medical treatment.

The name of the convicted person is Mashiyat Rashid (40). He was former CEO of the Tri-County Wellness Group, a medical provider,  in Michigan and Ohio.

He used to live in West Bloomfield, Michigan.

Accompanying the prison sentence is an order to pay over $51 million in restitution to Medicare in addition to forfeiting traceable proceeds of the health care fraud scheme to the United States (over $11.5 million, commercial real estate, residential real estate, and a Detroit Pistons season ticket membership).

Rashid pleaded guilty in 2018 to one count of conspiracy to commit health care fraud and wire fraud, and one count of money laundering. Twenty-one other defendants, including 12 physicians, have also been who were convicted after a one-month trial in 2020.

Court documents from 2008 to 2016 provide evidence that Rashid was the CEO of Tri-County Wellness wherein the clinics had a policy to offer patients, some were suffering from pain and others were drug dealers or opioid addicts, prescriptions of Oxycodone 30 mg, but forced them to submit to unnecessary back injections in exchange for the prescriptions.

Trial testimonies revealed that this practice was repetitive, sometimes causing patients more pain. Furthermore, it was revealed that Rashid only hired physicians who were willing to disregard patient care in the pursuit of money.