Florida Business Owner Sentenced To 65 Months In Prison For Defrauding Medicare Of $7 Million

Damian Williams, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced that CHRISTOPHER MARGAIT was sentenced today to 65 months in prison for conspiracy to commit health care fraud by fraudulently trafficking in orders for durable medical equipment such as back, knee, and wrist braces.  MARGAIT previously pled guilty to the charge and was sentenced today before United States District Judge Denise Cote.

U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said: “Christopher Margait faced justice today for illegally selling orders for durable medical equipment and thus defrauding Medicare of at least $7 million.  Such fraud schemes do real harm to Medicare—a vital, taxpayer-funded program that provides affordable health care to people over 65 or with disabilities.”

According to statements made in court and publicly filed documents in this case:

From at least August 2019 through May 2021, MARGAIT and his co-defendant, Matthew Taylor Witkowski, engaged in a scheme to defraud Medicare by illegally obtaining and selling fraudulent orders for durable medical equipment (“DME”) paid for by Medicare.  Using a business that he jointly owned and operated with Witkowski, and a call center that Witkowski operated in the Dominican Republic, MARGAIT illegally generated and purchased fraudulent orders for DME and then sold those fraudulent orders to pharmacies and DME suppliers, including suppliers in New York City.  Those pharmacies and DME suppliers then used those fraudulent orders as the basis for at least $7 million in fraudulent claims to Medicare.  Many of these fraudulent orders used names and personal health information of actual Medicare beneficiaries, without the beneficiaries’ authorization or prior knowledge.  Many of these fraudulent orders also contained professional information of doctors and other health-care providers enrolled in the Medicare program, as well as the purported electronic signatures of these providers, which were falsified and created without the authorization or knowledge of these providers.

During the course of the scheme, MARGAIT and Witkowski received more than $3.8 million in illegal kickbacks from DME suppliers, who made these payments to True Prospects Marketing, Inc., a company controlled by MARGAIT and Witkowski.

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MARGAIT, 45, of West Palm Beach, Florida, pled guilty on June 2, 2022, to a single count of conspiracy to commit health care fraud.  In addition, MARGAIT was sentenced to three years of supervised release and ordered to pay forfeiture of $3,853,442 and restitution of $7,000,000 to the Medicare program.

Witkowski, 38, a U.S. citizen who resided in the Dominican Republic since he was in college, was sentenced on April 20, 2023 to 60 months in prison and three years of supervised release.  He was also ordered to pay forfeiture of $4,065,995 and restitution of $8,131,990 to the Medicare program.

Mr. Williams praised the outstanding investigative work of the Office of the Inspector General of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

This case is being handled by the Office’s Complex Frauds and Cybercrime Unit. Assistant U.S. Attorney David Raymond Lewis is in charge of the prosecution.