Bell Nunnally Partner Jeffrey J. Ansley is quoted on the Dallas Business Journal/The Texas Lawbook in the article titled, “Forest Park Surgeons and Hospital Officials on Trial for Alleged Kickback Scheme.” The piece previews the large-scale federal health care trial that commenced on February 20 at the U.S. Court for the Northern District of Texas involving the now-defunct Forest Park Medical Center, where five doctors and other company executives are accused of orchestrating an elaborate, multimillion dollar kickback scheme that enriched the company’s principals through fraud.

Ansley commented on the significance of the case and the trial, “this is one of the largest and most important fraud cases in Texas over the past 10 years or more. Forest Park represents a very aggressive expansion by prosecutors of using an existing law to go after healthcare providers.”

Part of the defense’s strategy, according to the article, is that the doctors engaged in the kickback scheme cleared their activities with in-house counsel – meaning that they operated under the false premise that their actions were legal. Ansley commented on this defense noting, “the issue is not whether the lawyers’ advice was good or bad, but whether the lawyers had the appropriate amount of information and that the surgeons acted based on the lawyers’ advice.”

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