TOLEDO, Ohio — A Lucas County jury ordered Perrysburg health company Frontpath Health Coalition to pay $1.7 million in damages to competitor Medical Mutual of Ohio.
Mutual's lawsuit alleged that local government officials aided Frontpath in securing healthcare contracts for years.
"We're looking at tens and tens of millions of dollars to the taxpayers of Northwest Ohio," said Richard Knoth, an attorney with Baker Hostetler LLP who represents Medical Mutual of Ohio.
That's how much Knoth and his client claim was potentially lost in savings for the taxpayers of Northwest Ohio from competitor, Frontpath Health Coalition for, in his words, "rigging the system."
Knoth says Frontpath recruited public officials with the city of Toledo and Wood County to their board of trustees to help them secure contracts.
"They developed a system where the public officials would literally take our bidding information," he said, "and presentations which are confidential and turn them over to Frontpath."
During the four-week trial, email evidence showed Frontpath had received Medical Mutual's 2015 pricing data from a Toledo public official, who also happened to be a Frontpath board member at the time. In the email, Frontpath's CEO at the time said she had received it "confidentially." But sharing that information is against the law.
Frontpath attorney John McHugh III with McHugh & Mcarthy says they did have that information but it did not impact Frontpath's bids.
"While we shouldn't have had it and it's unfortunate that we retained it, there was no evidence that suggested that evidence was actually used or taken advantage of." he said.
McHugh also disputed Medical Mutual's belief that Frontpath recruited public officials in secret for their own benefit. He says it was quite the opposite.
"Each public entity knew who its representative was," McHugh said. "The city of Toledo knew Don Czerniak was on the board. Wood County knew Pam Boyer was on the board because they appointed them."
And McHugh says the board members who were also public officials were not the decision-makers on final contracts. But Knoth says his client still believes they influenced the decision and the jury's decision proves that.
"This case has always been about leveling the playing field," Knoth said, "showing the world and putting a spotlight on the fact that public officials were directly involved in wrongdoing."
Both Wood County and the city of Toledo's health care contracts will be up for bid next year.
In light of the jury's decision, McHugh says Frontpath will be appointing their own board members moving forward, instead of allowing other entities to nominate someone to the board.
It also plans to make sure they never accept any confidential information of any kind that could be interpreted as a conflict of interest.