Norfolk man charged with conspiring to gouge hospitals for N95 masks
NORFOLK — A town resident has been charged with, and agreed to plead guilty to, conspiring to price gouge hospitals for special masks that were in short supply at the start of the pandemic, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Massachusetts announced Thursday.
Jason Colantuoni, 35, was charged with one count of conspiracy to commit price gouging for the N95 filtering face piece respirators (N95 masks), in violation of the Defense Production Act, the office said.
A plea hearing has not yet been scheduled by the court.
A longtime friend of Colantuoni formed a company in Florida in March 2020 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. It is alleged that through April 2020, Colantuoni, the friend and the company’s head of sales conspired to use the company to exploit and profit off of the critical need of hospitals and healthcare workers for the scarce masks.
The trio allegedly accumulated N95 masks from various sources and then sold them through the company to desperate hospitals in Massachusetts and elsewhere at prices in excess of the prevailing market cost, officials said.
Prior to the pandemic, the hospitals to which the company sold the masks typically paid about 44 to 70 cents for each mask.
Through the company, the three allegedly offered to sell N95 masks to hospitals for as much as $11.95 each, authorities said.
They allegedly sold roughly 1,000 boxes of N95 masks to various hospitals, with each box containing 20 or 30 masks. The average price for the company’s purchases of the masks was about $4.48 per mask, while the average price for the company’s sales of N95 masks to hospitals was about $9.91 per mask, officials added.
The charge of conspiracy to commit price gouging in violation of the Defense Production Act provides for a sentence of up to one year in prison, up to one year of supervised release and a fine of up to $10,000.
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Bill Brady and Howard Locker of the Health Care Fraud Unit are prosecuting the case.
The attorney general established the COVID-19 Fraud Enforcement Task Force in May 2021 to tap the resources of the Department of Justice in partnership with other government agencies to enhance efforts to combat and prevent pandemic-related fraud.
https://www.thesunchronicle.com/news/local_news/norfolk-man-charged-with-conspiring-to-gouge-hospitals-for-n95-masks/article_eb4e8de9-e8b8-51d2-8924-675d8b21b35b.html