Federal Judge Gives Surgeon 15 Months for Role in Pacific Hospital Kickback Scheme

A federal judge last week sentenced an orthopedic surgeon to more than a year in prison for accepting more than $600,000 in bribes and kickbacks while referring patients for expensive spinal surgeries at a Southern California hospital sullied by fraud for more than a decade, the Department of Justice said. U.S. District Judge Josephine L. Staton on Friday sentenced Dr. Jeffrey David Gross to 15 months in federal prison and ordered him to forfeit almost $623,000 as part of a plea deal he struck with prosecutors last August, the DOJ said. Gross pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit honest ser...