United States of America v. Dr. Michael Taba

Dallas, Texas, criminal defense lawyer represented the Defendant charged with fraud.

Dr. Michael Taba, 61, of McKinney, Texas, accepted bribes paid by pharmacy owners to prescribe medically unnecessary compound creams to injured federal workers. Taba’s co-defendants owned and operated three pharmacies located in Fort Worth and Arlington, Texas. Over the course of the scheme, the pharmacy owners paid Taba and other doctors millions in illegal bribes and kickbacks. Evidence at trial showed these compounds were mixed in the back rooms of the pharmacies by untrained teenagers at a cost to Taba’s co-defendants of around $15 per prescription and then billed the DOL-OWCP for as much as $16,000 per prescription. Patients who received the creams testified at trial to the creams’ ineffectiveness and, in some instances, that using the creams resulted in painful, irritating skin rashes.

Between May 2014 and March 2017, the pharmacies billed the DOL-OWCP and Blue Cross Blue Shield more than $145 million and were paid more than $90 million for unnecessary prescriptions referred by Taba and other medical providers.

On Nov. 16, 2023, a federal jury in the Northern District of Texas convicted Taba on all counts of the superseding indictment, which included one count of conspiracy to commit health care fraud and three counts of health care fraud.

USPS OIG, DOL-OIG, VA-OIG, and IRS Criminal Investigation investigated the case.

Trial Attorney Ethan Womble and Acting Assistant Chief Catherine Wagner of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section prosecuted the case.

The Defendant was found guilty and was sentenced to 102 months in prison and was ordered to pay over $13 million in restitution for his role in a $145 million scheme to defraud the Department of Labor through the submission of fraudulent claims for prescription compound creams.