A former standout tight end for the Ole Miss Rebels, who briefly played in the NFL, faces more than 20 years in prison after he was convicted of defrauding Medicare and a veterans insurance program of $194 million.
Joel Rufus French, 47, of Amory, Mississippi, worked with overseas call centers and durable medical equipment firms that he secretly held ownership in to push orthotic braces for elderly people that didn’t need them, prosecutors and court records indicated.
“This defendant’s conduct was egregious: He targeted seniors suffering from Alzheimer’s and dementia and billed Medicare for orthotic braces for deceased patients and amputees,” Assistant U.S. Attorney General Tysen Duva said in a statement.
French, who was ranked as one of the top college tight ends in the 1990s, was convicted on all counts Tuesday by a federal jury in Tampa. He had paid sham telemedicine companies to obtain signed orders from doctors and nurse practitioners who never examined and often never even spoke to the patients, the U.S. Department of Justice said in a news release.
From mid-2017 through early 2019 French sold the orders to marketers and medical supply companies, which then submitted claims to Medicare, according to the 2024 indictment. French defrauded Medicare and CHAMPVA, the health care program for families of disabled or deceased veterans, by billing the programs for orthotic braces, through eight medical equipment supply companies that he owned and managed.
He used false documents to hide his connection to the companies, DOJ said. As part of the criminal activity, French at one point withdrew about $225,000 in cash from a bank in Mississippi, over $10,000 of which was placed in a bag and driven to Orlando. That was used to pay accomplices who sold him beneficiaries’ personal and insurance information, the DOJ explained.
A sentencing date has not been set. In addition to prison time, French will likely be forced to forfeit millions of dollars in bank accounts and in annuities with Pacific Life Insurance Co. and with Athene Annuity and Life Co., the indictment notes.
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Fraud
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