Feds Seize Luxury Cars from Pain Doc Accused of Billing Scam

Tuesday, December 15, 2015 | 0

Eugene Gosy

Federal prosecutors have seized a 2000 Ferrari and 2005 Ford GT Coupe from an Upstate New York doctor as restitution for $241,000 they say he swindled from workers' compensation insurers by billing for services he never performed.

The civil forfeiture action filed by the U.S. attorney for Western New York states that from 2010 to 2014, Dr. Eugene Gosy of Williamsville, New York billed workers' comp insurers 2,212 times for services that were provided when Gosy was off in far-flung locales, including his native Hungary, Vienna, Athens and Paris. The complaint states that the U.S. Attorney's Office is also pursuing a criminal investigation and may pursue charges of fraud and money laundering.

Gosy has denied the allegations. But earlier this month -- without admitting wrongdoing -- he agreed to sell the Ferrari and Ford -- which have been held in storage by the U.S. Marshall's Service -- and pay the federal government $241,771.60 as reimbursement for what the government called "unlawfully generated" earnings.

Prosecutors in the forfeiture action said they determined that Gosy's practice, Gosy & Associates Pain Treatment & Neurology, billed for services while he was out of country by reviewing his bank, credit card and airline records.

Prosecutors estimated that workers' compensation insurers paid $10.6 million to his practice during a four-year period. Gosy had signed statements that he provided or otherwise presided over the services for which he billed, but travel records show he was not at his office when many were performed.

According to a report in the Buffalo News, Gosy is a 55-year-old native of Hungary who opened his practice in 1999 and built it into one of the busiest chronic-pain practices in New York state. He told the newspaper during a 2011 interview that he saw the need for pain management "and found that helping someone in pain is extremely rewarding."

The newspaper said the FBI and other law-enforcement agencies raided Gosy's Williamsville office in September 2014 and left with boxes of material. The U.S. Attorney's Office filed a forfeiture complaint seeking to sieze Gosy's luxury cars a few months later.