Michigan Cancer Doctor Pleads Guilty: ‘I Knew That It Was Medically Unnecessary’

inquisitr.com Dr. Farid Fata, a prominent cancer doctor in Michigan, admitted in court to intentionally and wrongfully diagnosing healthy people with cancer. Fata also admitted to giving them chemotherapy drugs for the purpose of making a profit. The cancer doctor’s guilty plea shocked many in the courtroom, according to The Detroit Free Press. Fata owned Michigan Hematology Oncology, which had multiple offices throughout Detroit’s suburbs. Fata’s reach included offices in Clarkston, Bloomfield Hills, Lapeer, Sterling Heights, Troy, and Oak Park, Michigan. The doctor stated his plea in the absence of a plea deal and with tearful eyes, according to CBS News. “It is my choice,” Fata said on Tuesday of his guilty plea. In the Detroit courtroom, the cancer doctor named numerous, dangerous drugs that he prescribed to his patients. With each admittance he stated, “I knew that it was medically unnecessary.” U.S. Attorney Barbara McQuade will seek life in prison for what she called “the most egregious” health care fraud case she has ever seen. McQuade said that in addition to insurance fraud, which involved a $35-million Medicare fraud scheme from 2009 until the present, Fata also harmed, and in some cased subsequently killed, his patients with dangerous chemotherapy drugs they did not need. According to government records, Fata’s medical practice included 1,200 patients. The formerly prominent cancer doctor will be sentenced in February before U.S. District Judge Paul Borman. The doctor’s bond was set at $9 million. “In this case, we had Dr. Fata administering chemotherapy to people who didn’t need it, essentially putting poison into their bodies and telling them that they had cancer when they didn’t have cancer,” the prosecutor told the Detroit Free Press. “The idea that a doctor would lie to a patient just to make money is shocking… Dr. Fata was unique in that he saw patients not as people to heal, but as commodities to exploit.”