Florida Doctor Convicted of 162 Counts of Fraud

A North Florida jury convicted a Gainesville doctor of 162 counts of healthcare fraud. Ona M. Colasante, who was found guilty after a five-week trial, faces up to 10 years in prison at her sentencing in July.

Colasante owned and operated medical businesses known as the Hawthorne Medical Center (from 1998-2009) in Hawthorne, Florida, and the Colasante Clinic (from 2010-2013) in Gainesville. Colasante used a false billing scheme at those businesses to defraud Medicare, Medicaid and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Florida.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Florida described Colasante’s scheme as follows: Colasante and her employees ordered non-FDA-approved drugs at drastically reduced prices and administered them to unsuspecting patients. Colasante would then bill the insurance companies for the cost of FDA-approved drugs.

Colasante also billed the insurance companies for medical tests that were unnecessary and submitted false diagnosis codes to support her claims. She also billed insurance companies for counseling, treatment and training that was never performed. One example pointed out by the U.S. Attorney’s Office was that Colasante frequently billed the insurance companies for treatments to stop smoking even though the patients were already nonsmokers.

“Healthcare programs and patients depend on ethical practices from medical providers,” U.S. Attorney Christopher P. Canova said in commending the federal investigators and prosecutors after the trial.

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