Miami doctor who kept addicts drugged in a $60 million fraud gives up his license

Bal Harbour’s Drew Lieberman has finished his prison time for his part in a $60 million healthcare fraud, a role that involved keeping people with substance abuse problems sedated. Now, Lieberman is finished as a doctor.

The Florida Department of Health filed an administrative complaint against Lieberman on March 27, starting the discipline process that likely would have ended with revocation or at least suspension. But Lieberman’s online Florida Department of Health profile says he beat the department to the punch, voluntarily relinquishing his license.

He had been licensed in Florida since Oct. 23, 1990, and a convicted felon since Feb. 14, 2022, when he pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit healthcare fraud. For his role with Second Chance Detox, which operated as Compass Detox and WAR Network, Lieberman was sentenced to one year and a day prison time, $1.8 million in restitution, $39,000 in forfeiture and a $20,000 fine. He was released from FCI Miami on Jan. 26.

READ MORE: The doctor, the lawyer and the patient recruiter plead guilty in Compass Detox healthcare fraud

Because the fraud occurred well after Lieberman built his 5,442-square foot, three-bedroom, 5 1/2-bathroom Bal Harbour home, that wasn’t included in the forfeiture.

READ MORE: Surfside man in $3.5 million fraud wouldn’t testify against cohorts, alleges community pressure

Serving ‘comfort drink’ so patients would serve the fraud

As chief medical officer of Compass Detox, which operated at 1190 Hibiscus Dr. in Pembroke Pines, Lieberman’s job should have been making sure Compass was the right place for patients as well as starting and monitoring treatment plans.

Instead, as described in Lieberman’s admission of facts, he and medical director Jose Santeiro kept their customers hooked on drugs to make money.

They prescribed “controlled substances, prescription medications, and over-the-counter medications, in quantities and combinations that at times grossly diverged from legitimate medical practice” and impaired them enough to prevent proper therapy participation.

Some of the substances were “benzodiazepines, which are known drugs of abuse, and a substance called a “comfort drink” (also known as a “comfort shots or “comfort meds’‘),” the admission continued. “Lieberman created the comfort drink in part to keep patients sedated and so that they would be more likely to remain at Compass Detox. These medications also incentivized patients, including patients who did not qualify for detox, to continually return to Compass Detox.”

So, patients stayed for as long as possible. Then the group submitted fraudulent insurance claims for detox and residential treatment.

From June 2017 through September 2020, with Lieberman’s help, the group submitted least $60,576,082 in fraudulent claims to insurance companies and got paid $18,515,385 on those claims.

Where are the Compass Detox gang members now?

The group that pulled off the healthcare fraud have spent time at FCI Miami, the downtown federal prison.

Lieberman was there. Bal Harbour brothers and Compass Detox owners Jonathan Markovich and Daniel Markovich, owners of Second Chance Detox, are scheduled to be there until Dec. 8, 2034, and Sept. 23, 2028, respectively. Compass and WAR Network medical director Jose Santeiro is there until March 8, 2026.

Bay Harbor Islands attorney and Second Chance Detox co-owner Richard Waserstein was there until his March 20 release after pleading guilty to conspiracy to launder money. Like Lieberman, Waserstein didn’t wait for the professional discipline process and gave up his law license last year after pleading guilty to conspiracy to launder money.

Christopher Garnto is doing his time at FPC Pensacola, with scheduled release on Sept. 19. Patient recruiter Frank Bosch is at FCI Coleman in Sumterville until Nov. 1.

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