A Panola County man was sentenced Monday to two years in prison following his conviction for his role in a scheme to defraud Medicare and TRICARE by prescribing and dispensing medically unnecessary foot bath medications and ordering medically unnecessary testing of toenails in exchange for kickbacks and bribes.

According to court documents, Marion Shaun Lund, D.P.M., 54, of Batesville, owned and operated a podiatry clinic, as well as an in-house pharmacy in Oxford. Lund routinely wrote prescriptions for and dispensed antibiotic and antifungal drugs to be mixed into a tub of warm water for patients to soak their feet.

Rather than prescribing drugs based on the individualized needs of patients, Lund prescribed foot bath medications in order to maximize reimbursements from Medicare, TRICARE and other health care benefit programs, regardless of medical necessity.

In addition, Lund took toenail clippings and wound cultures from patients and sent them to a lab for diagnostic testing, even though such testing was not medically necessary.

From April 2020 through March 2022, Lund caused the submission of over $1.4 million in claims to Medicare and TRICARE for unnecessary prescriptions of foot bath medications and diagnostic testing of toenails, resulting in over $700,000 in reimbursements. In exchange for his prescriptions and orders, Lund was paid cash kickbacks by a purported marketer.

On Feb. 2 Lund entered a plea of guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit health care fraud. On Monday morning, U.S. District Judge Glen Davidson sentenced Lund to 24 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release and ordered Lund to pay restitution in the amount of $851,428.  Lund is the fourth defendant, including three medical professionals, to plead guilty and be sentenced for a role in the scheme. In October 2021, Logan Hunter Power pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States and to pay and receive kickbacks, and in October 2022, Power was sentenced to 25 months in prison.

In August 2022, Jared Lee Spicer, D.P.M., pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit health care fraud and was sentenced to serve a term of three years probation.

In September 2022, Carey “Craig” Williams, D.P.M., pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit health care fraud and was sentenced to serve 42 months in prison.

Trial Attorney Sara E. Porter and Assistant Chief Justin M. Woodard of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Clayton A. Dabbs of the Northern District of Mississippi prosecuted the case.

The Fraud Section leads the Criminal Division’s efforts to combat health care fraud through the Health Care Fraud Strike Force Program. Since March 2007, this program, composed of 15 strike forces operating in 25 federal districts, has charged more than 5,000 defendants who collectively have billed federal health care programs and private insurers more than $24 billion.

In addition, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, working in conjunction with the Office of the Inspector General for the Department of Health and Human Services, are taking steps to hold providers accountable for their involvement in health care fraud schemes.