NEW YORK – The co-owner of a defunct Bellevue, Washington-based clinical laboratory was sentenced this week to two years in prison for his role in an illegal lab kickback scheme.
Richard Reid, who was co-owner and vice president of sales of Northwest Physicians Laboratory (NWPL), was convicted in March 2022, of one count of conspiracy to solicit and receive kickbacks involving healthcare programs and four counts of receipt of kickbacks. He had faced up to five years in prison on each count.
Reid steered $6.5 million in urine drug testing business for patients covered by Medicare and TRICARE to two other labs in exchange for more than $3.7 million in kickbacks paid to NWPL. NWPL was not able to do the testing itself because it is physician-owned. Physician-owned labs are not allowed to test urine samples for patients covered by government insurance.
Reid and his co-conspirators described the payments as being for marketing services, but according to the DOJ, they never performed any marketing services.
Three other defendants have pleaded guilty and await sentencing. Former NWPL CEO Jae Lee was sentenced to two years in prison in May 2022. Kevin Puls, the former executive director of NWPL, was sentenced to 90 days in prison and a year of supervised release.