The owner of a Frisco hospice agency accused of telling nurses to overdose patients on morphine to speed their deaths filed lawsuits against several employees and two executives who quit in the days after an FBI raid.
On Sept. 17, 2015, agents searched Novus Health Services, claiming in a warrant that the company’s founder, Brad Harris, was suspected of committing health care fraud and had made comments to employees like, “You need to make this patient go bye-bye.”
In late October, the company filed a lawsuit against nursing director Patricia Armstrong, accusing her of violating a no-compete contract when she left on Oct. 6, 2015, and went to work for another company.
The suit asked for between $200,000 and $1 million.
The following month, Novus also sued four former marketing executives, also accusing them of violating their contracts.
In court papers, an attorney for the executives, Jacob Kring, blasted the company for not disclosing the FBI investigation in its lawsuit.
"Novus and its CEO Brad Harris had their offices raided by the FBI ... for euthanizing patients for profits and committing Medicaid/Medicare fraud,” Kring wrote. “(Novus) never disclosed this fact to the court."
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He also said the raid had effectively put Novus out of business.
“To compound the injury, (Novus) in a Grinch-like act of spite, refused to pay each Defendant their final check,” he wrote.
Both cases were later dropped.
A separate lawsuit named two of Harris' own business partners who left soon after the FBI search.
The suit, filed by Novus' parent company, HNA Holdings, named Preston Huffington and Samuel Anderson and two law firms.
The suit claimed: "In short, Huffington and Anderson grabbed $200,000 of HNA's money for their personal benefit on their way out the door."
The executives said the money went to the lawyers because Harris had promised to pay their legal fees.
Court records show this case was closed in January.
Harris has not responded to repeated requests for comment.
Nobody has been charged in the case.
An FBI spokeswoman has declined comment.
Staff Writer Valerie Wigglesworth of The Dallas Morning News contributed to this report.
