Forest Hills Pharmacist Pleads Guilty To $6.9M Drug Rebate Scam

FOREST HILLS, QUEENS — A Queens pharmacist accused of pocketing $6.9 million in reimbursements for drugs he never dispensed pleaded guilty to federal conspiracy charges Wednesday, federal prosecutors announced.

Arkadiy Khaimov, of Forest Hills, was accused of using a drug manufacturer's co-pay coupon program to get millions of dollars worth of drug reimbursement payments sent to three New York City pharmacies he ran, including two in Queens, prosecutors with the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York said.

As part of his guilty plea, Khaimov agreed to forfeit $489,000 of his earnings from the scheme, according to a news release.

"With today’s guilty plea, Khaimov is held accountable for bilking a program designed to reduce the cost of prescription medicines so that he could line his own pockets with millions of dollars,” Seth D. DuCharme, the acting U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said in a statement.

The scheme started in February 2017 and involved more than a year's worth of phony reimbursement claims based on prescriptions written by an unnamed Nassau County doctor, according to prosecutors.

Prosecutors said Khaimov, 37, and two co-conspirators requested reimbursements for 18-day or 21-day supplies of the drug so they could file two reimbursement claims a month, even though pharmacists typically give four weeks' worth of the drug at a time.

Court records do not disclose the manufacturer and medication involved in the case.

Khaimov faces a sentence of up to 20 years in prison.