Community Corner

Parsippany Lab Bribed Doctors for Patient Referrals, Attorney Says

Frank Santangelo allegedly accepted more than $700K in bribes to have physicians order more blood tests and samples be referred to the Parsippany company.

Four employees of a Parsippany-based biodiagnostic laboratory were charged in connection with allegedly bribing doctors to refer patient blood samples to their lab, U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman announced Tuesday.

One of the doctors, Frank Santangelo, 43, of Boonton, a physician with offices in Montville and Wayne, was charged in the federal complaint with accepting bribes for several years and violating fidelity to his patients, Fishman stated in a press release.

Santangelo allegedly accepted more than $700,000 in bribes from Biodiagnostic Laboratory Services LLC (BLS) and sent the Parsippany company more than $4.2 million in referrals, including money from private health insurance companies and Medicare, between 2006 and 2013.

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BLS president David Nicoll, 39, of Mountain Lakes, Scott Nicoll, 32, of Wayne, a BLS employee and David Nicoll’s brother, and Craig Nordman, 34, of Whippany, were also charged in the complaint. Nordman was a BLS employee and CEO of Advantech Sales LLC, an entity BLS allegedly used to make illegal payments. BLS is also charged with conspiracy.

According to the unsealed complaint, BLS bribed physicians to refer patients to their lab and order unnecessary lab tests, said Shantelle Kitchen, acting special agent in charge with the IRS-Criminal Investigation Newark field office. Physicians were often bribed under the guise of lease, service, and/or consulting agreements, Fishman said.

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Between 2006 and 2009, BLS paid physicians thousands of dollars a month for space in medical offices that BLS did not need or even used to perform routine blood drawings.

In a text message the complaint references, David Nicoll wrote to Santangelo about the status of their referral agreement, stating that BLS: “really can’t afford the 40-50,000 [dollars] a month if the girls aren’t going to be drawing any blood,”  to which Santangelo responded by stating, “U no u can count on me!” and “I never let u down!”

The defendants were scheduled to appear before the Hon. Judge Madeline Cox Arleo in Newark federal court Tuesday.


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