Former Methodist Hospital Employees Plead Guilty to Criminal HIPAA Violations
Five former Methodist Hospital employees have pleaded guilty to criminal violations of HIPAA for accessing and disclosing the information of patients to a third party for financial gain. The former hospital workers were contacted by Roderick Harvey, 41, of Memphis, and were paid to provide him with the names and telephone numbers of patients who had been involved in motor vehicle accidents. The data collected by Harvey was then sold to personal injury attorneys and chiropractors.
The HIPAA Privacy Rule prohibits healthcare workers from accessing patient data unless there is a valid work reason for doing so, and disclosures of patient data to third parties are not permitted unless there is a valid reason for the disclosure (treatment, payment, business operations) unless consent is obtained from the patient. Accessing and disclosing patient information for financial gain without the consent of the patients is a criminal offense.
Between November 2017 and December 2020, Kirby Dandridge, 38, Sylvia Taylor, 43, Kara Thompson, 31, Melanie Russell, 41, and Adrianna Taber, 26, violated HIPAA and provided Harvey with patient information. The former employees were terminated for the HIPAA violations, and along with Harvey, were indicted by a federal grand jury in November 2022. Harvey faced a conspiracy charge and seven counts of obtaining patient information with the intent to sell it for financial gain. The former Methodist Hospital employees were separately charged for violating HIPAA.
Harvey pled guilty to the conspiracy charge on April 21, 2023, and will be sentenced on August 1, 2023. Harvey faces up to five years in jail, a fine of up to $250,000, and three years of supervised release. Dandridge, Taylor, Thompson, Russell, and Taber each face a maximum of one year in jail, $50,000 fine, and one year of supervised release and will be sentenced on five separate dates between April 25, 2023, and June 21, 2023.
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Sentencing
- Roderick Harvey – 5 years of probation, including one year of home detention and a $50,000 fine
- Kirby Dandridge – 1 year of probation and a $2,500 fine
- Sylvia Taylor – 1 year of probation and a $3,000 fine
- Kara Thompson – 2 years of probation
- Melanie Russell – 1 year of probation and a $1,000 fine
- Adrianna Taber – time served plus 6 months on supervised release
