It was truly a case of buyer beware.
The husband and wife owners of a former Ozone Park pharmacy have been arrested for allegedly dispensing medication without a licensed pharmacist and billing Medicaid $846,000 for medications that had never been purchased.
According to the complaint filed in Queens Criminal Court, Diwan Gulati, 65, and his wife, Urmil Arya Gulati, 62, of Glen Head, Long Island, operated Chotu Pharmacy at 74-17 101st Avenue in Ozone Park until it closed in April of this year.
Neither one is a licensed pharmacist, according to Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, but they filled patients’ prescriptions themselves for approximately five months.
“These defendants allegedly defrauded Medicaid and placed their customers in danger by dispensing prescriptions to the public without a properly trained and licensed pharmacist present,” said Cuomo. “My office will continue to fight this kind of fraud and work to protect the public from unscrupulous individuals who put personal gain over the safety of their customers.”
The Gulatis arrest comes after an investigation and audit conducted by the Attorney General’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit, which found that while the licensed pharmacist was on sick leave for an extended period, the business continued to operate without a replacement. During this time, Diwan was allegedly paid by Medicaid for the medications that he dispensed to Chotu Pharmacy patients while unsupervised by a licensed pharmacist.
The complaint also states that auditors reviewed the medication inventory and purchasing records of Chotu Pharmacy and discovered that from January 2004 to January 2008, the business billed Medicaid $846,000 more than the amount of drugs it actually purchased from licensed drug wholesalers.
The couple, including Chotu Corporation, was charged with two counts of grand larceny in the third degree, a class D felony, which carries a maximum sentence of seven years in prison. They were also charged with unauthorized practice of a profession and offering a false instrument for filing, class E felonies, which carry maximum sentences of four years in prison.
