Orange County Man Pleads Guilty to Orchestrating Fraud Scheme that Submitted Nearly $270 Million in Bogus Claims to Medi-Cal
April 7, 2026LOS ANGELES – An Orange County man has pleaded guilty to submitting nearly $270 million in fraudulent claims over an 11-month span to Medi-Cal for expensive prescription drugs containing generic ingredients that were not medically necessary and, in many instances, not provided to the purported recipients, the Justice Department announced today.
Paul Richard Randall, 66, of Orange, pleaded guilty Monday to one count of wire fraud committed while on release. He has been in federal custody since June 2025.
“This defendant used a public health program as his personal piggy bank,” said First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli. “This guilty plea should send a message that this administration — consistent with the President’s war on fraud — will not turn a blind eye while criminals fleece taxpayers.”
“Thanks to the leadership of President Donald Trump, the Department, working closely with the Task Force to Eliminate Fraud, is supercharging efforts to take down every fraudster and bring them to justice,” said Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche. “In one day, the Department prosecuted the theft of a half-billion in taxpayer dollars. All those ripping off the American people are on notice.”
“The defendant was a repeat fraudster who caused Medi-Cal, a program designed to help those in need . . .
. . . According to his plea agreement, Randall, along with Kyrollos Mekail, 37, of Moreno Valley, and Patricia Anderson, 58, of West Hills,
took advantage of Medi-Cal’s suspension of its requirement that health care providers obtain prior authorization before providing certain health care services or medications as a condition of reimbursement.
The suspension of the prior authorization requirements was part of an ongoing transition of Medi-Cal’s prescription drug program to a new payment system.
Through a business called Monte Vista Pharmacy,
Randall and his co-schemers exploited Medi-Cal’s prior authorization suspension by billing Medi-Cal tens of millions of dollars per month for dispensing high-reimbursement, non-contracted, generic drugs through Monte Vista Pharmacy . . .
https://www.justice.gov/usao-cdca/pr/orange-county-man-pleads-guilty-orchestrating-fraud-scheme-submitted-nearly-270
