$10 million dollar fraud sends Clarence man to prison

Oct. 29--Scott Trapp spent a lot of time as a pharmaceutical salesman pushing drug compounds such as pain patches and pain creams.

The problem is that Trapp used fake prescriptions to market medications that were medically unnecessary but carried high reimbursement rates.

In one case, the Clarence man pushed a pain cream that cost health insurers $22,000 a month.

On Tuesday. Trapp, 50, was sentenced to three years in prison and ordered to pay $10 million in restitution to four health care programs.

"This is an extraordinarily serious financial crime," U.S. District Judge Lawrence J. Vilardo told Trapp. "Ten million dollars is a lot of money."

Federal prosecutors said Trapp's scheme started in 2014, continued until 2016 and included the use of fraudulent prescriptions.

In his plea agreement, the former salesman admitted asking a friend, a doctor, to sign blank prescriptions for him and his wife and then, without the doctor's knowledge, copying the prescriptions and substituting the names of other patients.

He also recruited others to take part in the scheme.

"This resulted in substantial profits for the defendant and his associates," Assistant U.S. Attorney Maura K. O'Donnell said Tuesday.

Unlike most pharmaceutical sales people who market to physicians, Trapp dealt directly with patients. He would identify people with health insurance that would cover the high reimbursement compounds and then persuade them to receive the drugs, even though they lacked a doctor's authorization.

Compound medications are the result of a doctor or pharmacist mixing or altering drugs to meet the needs of an individual patients.

O'Donnell, who prosecuted the case with Assistant U.S. Attorney Kevin Robinson, said the compounds Trapp pushed were either ineffective or medically unnecessary.

"I didn't see things the way I see them now," Trapp said on Tuesday. "Now, I think of success as the love of my wife and family."

Choking back emotion, Trapp said his conviction -- he pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit health care fraud -- left him feeling isolated and defeated.

That changed, he told Vilardo, when he took a job as a dishwasher in a Clarence restaurant, the only job he could find, and over time realized his priorities were misplaced.

Defense attorney Rodney O. Personius acknowledged the $10 million in losses for four health care programs but noted that his client's share was a fraction of that -- $500,000. He also pointed out that Trapp and his wife are forfeiting $225,000 to the government.

"I think it's symbolic that he's giving all that up," Personsius said.

Prosecutors said the FBI's investigation into Trapp's scheme is ongoing but declined to comment on who the additional targets may be.

The victims of the scheme were BlueCross BlueShield of Western New York, the Verizon Medical Expense Plan for New York and New England Associates, National Grid USA and Sunovion Pharmaceuticals.

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