Submitting False Billings to a Prison System

[karla2489]

My question involves criminal law for the state of: New York.

The husband of a friend of mine was recently arrested and charged with one count of grand larceny in the third-degree and 40 counts of offering to a false instrument for filing in the first degree for allegedly improper billings to the state prison system. Her husband was an employee of the State of New York, Department of Corrections as an oral surgeon. He worked for 15 years in the prison system providing dental services to inmates. He is being charged with submitting and being paid $14,000 for work he never performed. He supposedly had been doing this since 2009, and under investigation by the state for the last couple of years. He was released on bail. My question is should he be convicted, what would be the worst and best possible case scenarios? Also, is this a felony and could he lose his NYS License to practice dentistry?

[CourtClerk]

That's a relatively small amount of money that he billed for work never performed in 5 years. However, yes, he should expect to do some time in prison and absolutely he will lose his dental license and probably have a hard time being licensed in any other state.

I hope your friend has a job herself because her husband's greed is going to cost them a fortune after fines, restitution, a loss of job and income and the fact that a convicted felon is going to have a hard time finding a job that doesn't equate to retail sales at Walmart.

[Mr. Knowitall]

Your dentist friend needs to consult a lawyer. We don't know the facts, and the facts matter a great deal. If he was doing six figures worth of work per year, and his billings were off by roughly $2,000 per year, there may be a plausible non-criminal explanation. If he billing $3,000 of work for the prison system per year and two thirds of the amount billed was fraudulent, he's going to have a much more difficult time coming up with an innocent explanation.