Firm News & Legal Information Center

Yesterday, the Department of Justice announced that its U.S. Attorney’s Office in Manhattan (Southern District of New York) had filed an indictment charging 18 former NBA players and 1 of their spouses with federal crimes relating to the defrauding of the NBA players’ association HRA (health reimbursement account). In short, the alleged mastermind of the crime, Terrence Williams, allegedly recruited former players into his scheme. They allegedly created fake invoices for chiropractic, medical, and dental services that they did not in fact receive, and then submitted those invoices to the HRA for reimbursement for those phony services.  The defendants are charged with violations of 18 U.S.C. § 1341 (wire fraud) and 18 U.S.C. § 1347 (health care fraud), and Terrence Williams also faces a charge of identity theft for bizarrely impersonating a health care plan administrator to try to shake down another player for his kickbacks under the scheme.

Of course some of these players may in fact be innocent. But you can expect the government’s case to be strong here. The prosecutors will probably be able to demonstrate that the medical/dental/chiropractic services detailed in these invoices submitted for reimbursement were not in fact provided. And the government almost certainly has the bank records, phone calls, emails, and text messages showing the transactions between Terrence Williams and the other participating defendants. There are probably several cooperating witnesses as well (i.e. former players who did not participate in the scheme though they were approached about it). So, most of these defendants – if not all of them – are likely to plead guilty. Indeed, the overwhelming majority of federal defendants do.

Sentencing at the federal level is an inexact science.  There is no statutory minimum here, and sentencing judges will look to the federal Sentencing Guidelines for guidance. However, the sentences suggested by those Guidelines are merely advisory, and not mandatory or binding.  In fraud cases, the biggest variable in the Guidelines calculation is the amount of loss (assuming these defendants mostly do not have criminal records already). The defendants will likely be in Criminal History Category I, on the left hand column of the sentencing table provided for by the Sentencing Guidelines.  Their base offense levels for Wire Fraud/Health Care fraud would be six. See U.S.S.G. 2B1.1. But then, you would have to add an additional offense level for the amount of fraud. There is some debate about whether this number should reflect “actual loss” or “intended loss,” which would make a difference here as the intended loss (i.e. the amount of false invoices submitted) was $3.9 million overall, but the actual loss was $2.5 million overall. Theoretically, each member of the group could be held responsible for the entire $3.9 million, as they were co-conspirators in a group effort to defraud the HRA. However, normally, in fraud cases, defendants are held accountable, so to speak, for the amount of money they themselves were actually involved in stealing (though that is not always the case, it is a fuzzy question of foreseeability). Terrence Williams, however, as the mastermind of the scheme, would probably have to add at least 16 levels to his sentencing offense level, in light of his being in charge of the entire scheme. Additionally, “masterminds” or managers of criminal enterprises can have their sentencing levels increased by another four levels. Pleading guilty tends to get a defendant an overall three-level reduction in sentencing offense level, so Terrence Williams could find himself at a suggested Guidelines sentencing range of 57-71 months (offense level 25), or roughly 5-6 years in federal prison.