PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Nearly a dozen people who had ties to a South Philadelphia pharmacy have been charged in a $20 million Medicaid and Medicare fraud operation.
Pennsylvania Attorney General Michelle Henry said the owner and operator of Broad Street Family Pharmacy allegedly made fraudulent claims between 2016 and 2021. Nine people were charged in connection with the scheme.
Within that span, they allegedly pretended to fill prescriptions for expensive medications while defrauding the Medicaid and Medicare programs of millions of dollars.
Henry said the pharmacy paid their customers cash in exchange for bringing their prescriptions to the pharmacy, and they could sell pills back to the pharmacy for cash or other medications.
Investigators estimated that the involved medications accounted for 86% of the pharmacy’s billings to Medicaid over the five-year period.
Elizabeth Thompson, 70, owned the pharmacy and her 70-year-old husband, Peter Dello Buono, operated it. They were among those charged for engineering the scheme. The pharmacist, 70-year-old Frank Bengermino, was also charged.