NEW ORLEANS, LA — This is an official press release from the U.S. Department of Justice (Criminal - Criminal White Collar and Corporate Enforcement), published as received.

NEW ORLEANS, LA – U.S. Attorney Duane A. Evans announced that ROBERT LAKE (“LAKE”), age 62, a resident of East Rockaway, New York, was arrested in the Dallas Fort Worth International Airport, after disembarking from an international flight, after being previously indicted for federal healthcare fraud.

LAKE had been indicted on October 18, 2025 for one count of conspiracy to commit healthcare fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 1347 and 1349, and three counts of healthcare fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1347.  According to the indictment, LAKE was a licensed prosthetist and orthotist who operated his own durable medical equipment (“DME”) supply companies, TRISETO and ORTHO WORKS.  From 2017 to around July 2019, LAKE purchased doctors’ orders for medically unnecessary orthotic braces and submitted claims to Medicare.  After Medicare revoked TRISETO’s enrollment in the program in July 2019, LAKE shifted to selling doctors’ orders through his marketing company, CRANIAL SCIENTIFIC, in exchange for kickbacks.  The doctors’ orders were medically unnecessary and, at times, manipulated at LAKE’s direction.

LAKE is charged with conspiring with others, including Houma resident, Patrick Haydel.  Haydel had previously pled guilty to his role in this same fraudulent scheme.  Haydel and LAKE later learned that several physicians complained that they never signed the orders sold by LAKE, and further that Medicare beneficiaries and their caregivers, complained they neither requested nor needed the DME they received.  After the government executed a search warrant on Haydel’s business, LAKE transferred over $2 million to a Philippine account.  In total, LAKE and Haydel submitted more than $17 million in fraudulent DME claims to Medicare, for which Medicare reimbursed them more than $8 million.

As to each count, LAKE faces up to ten years in prison, followed by up to three years of supervised release after release from prison, a fine of up to $250,000, or twice the gross gain to LAKE or the gross loss to any victims, and a mandatory $100 special assessment fee.

U.S. Attorney Evans reiterated that an indictment is merely a charge and that the guilt of the defendant must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt.

U.S. Attorney Evans praised the work of the Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General.  Trial Attorney Kelly Walters of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Nicholas Moses, Healthcare Fraud Coordinator for the Eastern District of Louisiana, are prosecuting the case.