Although Wisconsin faces a budget deficit in the billions, it will soon be $9 million richer in damages after a Dane County Jury found a pharmaceutical company guilty of fraudulent prices Monday.
According to a statement from the Wisconsin Department of Justice, the jury determined the company, Pharmacia Corporation, committed Medicaid and consumer fraud by reporting significantly inflated drug prices to health-care providers. Medicaid then had to reimburse these providers at a price much higher than the drugs' actual value.
The company, which violated the Medicaid Fraud law 1,440,000 times, may have to pay millions more in penalties on a case-by-case basis, the statement said.
Those fraudulent price reports cheated the taxpayers of Wisconsin. I won't tolerate fraud,"" Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen said in the statement.
Pharmacia must give $7 million to the state to compensate for its money lost because of these high prices in addition to the $2 million it owes for violating consumer protection laws, according to the statement.
