Lab Owner Handed Nine Years in Prison for COVID-19 Testing Scheme
- January 31, 2025
Lourdes Navarro was sentenced to nine years in prison for her role in fraudulently submitting claims to governmental and private insurance programs during the COVID‑19 pandemic for expensive respiratory pathogen panel (RPP) tests that were medically unnecessary and never ordered by health care providers, the Department of Justice announced January 28.
Navarro and co-conspirator Imran Shams owned and controlled Matias Clinical Laboratory, doing business as Health Care Providers Laboratory (HCPL). Navarro and Shams conspired to obtain nasal swab specimens for the purported purpose of conducting screening tests to identify and isolate individuals infected with COVID-19. However, Navarro and Shams caused HCPL to perform RPP tests on most of the specimens, even though only COVID-19 testing had been ordered and there was no medical justification for conducting RPP tests.
Shams was previously sentenced to ten years in prison.