Physician Convicted of Drug and Health Care Fraud Charges

Bingham Farms physician David Jankowski, 62, was convicted on July 11, 2022, by a federal jury in Detroit on thirty charges related to the unlawful distribution of Schedule II, III and IV controlled substances and health care fraud, announced United States Attorney Dawn N. Ison.

The charges on which he was convicted stemmed from Jankowski’s operation of Summit Medical Group, a purported medical clinic formerly located in Dearborn Heights and Southfield, MI. According to the evidence presented at trial, Dr. Jankowski wrote medically unnecessary prescriptions for controlled substances such as Oxycontin, Oxycodone, morphine, hydrocodone, and Xanax. He also prescribed controlled substances after receiving cash from patient recruiters who brought patients to his practice. The evidence demonstrated that Jankowski issued or authorized the issuance of more than 1.7 million Schedule II controlled substances to individuals outside the course of professional medical practice and for no legitimate medical purpose in exchange for compensation. As part of this scheme, Dr. Jankowski also issued or authorized the issuance more than 800,000 Schedule III controlled substances and more than 870,00 Schedule IV controlled substances. The evidence also showed that Jankowski used his access to controlled substances to lure patients into his health care fraud scheme. Patients were attracted to his practice by the easy access to controlled substances. Many of these patients had no need for the drugs. Instead, the controlled substances were sold on the streets to feed the addictions of opioid addicts. Trial testimony and exhibits showed that Jankowski then submitted false and fraudulent insurance claims asserting that he had provided necessary treatment to these patients. The claims were submitted to Michigan auto insurance companies, private health care insurers, Medicare and Medicaid. Based upon these fraudulent claims, Dr. Jankowski received more than $29.3 million from the auto and private insurance companies and more than $6 million from Medicare and Medicaid.

Dr. Jankowski was convicted of thirty of the thirty-two counts with which he was charged and faces a statutory maximum penalty of 20 years in federal prison.