A South Florida businessman who built a mini-empire of medical-supply companies is headed to federal prison for a long stretch. On Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Donald Graham sentenced Michael Kochen to 17 years after a jury found he and a telemarketing partner ran a scheme that billed roughly $35 million to Medicare. The judge also ordered Kochen to repay about $19 million.
Kochen was not the only one going away. Sandro Herek, who operated the telemarketing and telemedicine side of the operation and supplied patients to Kochen, received a sentence of slightly more than seven years behind bars. Both men have been ordered to surrender to federal custody on Aug. 9, 2026.
Prosecutors said Kochen controlled a network of medical supply outfits operating under the CLADD Group LLC banner in North Miami and targeted Medicare Advantage beneficiaries for orthotic braces and other durable medical equipment. As Miami Herald coverage noted, the companies billed Medicare for thousands of braces that physicians often approved without any meaningful look at the patients they were supposedly treating.
How Prosecutors Say The Scheme Worked
According to federal prosecutors, the business model leaned heavily on aggressive call centers that pitched braces to seniors and harvested their personal and insurance information. Telemedicine providers then generated prescriptions, often after cursory or nonexistent evaluations, and funneled the paperwork back to Kochen’s companies, which turned those scripts into claims.
In a press release from the U.S. Department of Justice, officials said the jury found the defendants submitted about $34 million in false claims and collected more than $17 million from Medicare Advantage plans. In other words, the scheme did not just generate fake paperwork, it generated real money.
Judge Departs From Federal Recommendations
Kochen’s 17-year sentence still landed below what federal prosecutors wanted. They had urged Judge Graham to impose a 20-year term and described Kochen and his father, Marcello Kochen, as “professional fraudsters.” But the judge said that sentencing in similar South Florida health care fraud cases has been all over the map, and he opted to go under the government’s guideline calculations.
Defense attorneys tried to steer the narrative in a different direction, arguing that Kochen ran a legitimate medical supplier that actually delivered equipment to patients, rather than a pure paper mill, according to the Miami Herald.
Charges And Statutes
Kochen’s conviction sheet is lengthy. Jurors found him guilty of conspiracy to commit health care and wire fraud, six separate counts of health care fraud, a conspiracy to pay and receive health care kickbacks, and three counts of paying kickbacks.
Herek was convicted of conspiracy to commit health care and wire fraud, one count of health care fraud, and multiple kickback-related counts tied to the referral pipeline that fed Kochen’s companies. The specific charges and their statutory penalties are laid out in detail in a release from the U.S. Department of Justice.
What’s Next
Both men are scheduled to report to federal custody on Aug. 9, 2026, beginning the prison terms that cap this long running case. On the financial side, courts will now turn to recovering taxpayer funds through restitution and any assets that can be forfeited.
Prosecutors have signaled they plan to keep the pressure on, pursuing collection efforts to claw back the money Medicare Advantage plans paid out on the fraudulent claims, and wrapping up remaining forfeiture issues tied to the investigation.
Local Context
For South Florida, another major Medicare fraud prosecution landing with double digit prison time is less a surprise than a recurring headline. The region has long been a hot spot for health care scams, and this case drew local attention when the jury returned guilty verdicts in December.
Hoodline previously reported that the defendants were found guilty in $34 million Medicare scam. With sentences now handed down, the years-long federal probe has effectively crossed the finish line, even as the government works to collect on the bill.
