Federal prosecutors call him the “most egregious fraudster in the history of this country. He was supposed to help his patients, but instead, Dr. Farid Fata was giving chemotherapy to cancer-free patients in order to charge medicare millions of dollars in unnecessary treatment.

Authorities say that Fata, a Detroit-area doctor, gave cancer treatment drugs to patients who didn’t actually have cancer, CNN reports

“To Fata, they said, “patients were not people. They were profit centers,” investigators said. He pleaded guilty to 13 counts of Medicare fraud, one count of conspiracy to pay or receive kickbacks and two counts of money laundering.

One patient, Robert Sobieray, told ABC news that he went to Fata and “was given chemotherapy treatments for two and a half years. But he never had cancer.”

“What was the motivation? Why, why me? I don’t know what did I ever do to him. It just gets to me,” Sobieray said.

The painful chemotherapy treatments were so strong that his teeth fell out and his jaw started to change shape. Years after finding out he didn’t have cancer, he has lost all but one of his teeth, and left him physically sick.

“I would like to eat a good meal again someday. Like salad, used to love eating salad. I can’t eat that anymore. A lot of things I love I can’t eat anymore,” Sobieray said. “With all the bills piling up, I can’t afford to get new teeth,” he added.

According to prosecutors, some 553 patients received medically unnecessary infusions or injections. Fata forfeited $17.6 million that he collected from Medicare and private insurance companies and was sentenced Friday to 45 years in prison.

Watch more on this story in the ABC News clip below

What a horrible crime! Do you think he received enough punishment for his crime? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below.

Continue Reading