CAMDEN – The president of a New Orleans-area company was sentenced to 30 months in federal prison today for having his company defraud New Brunswick-based Johnson & Johnson of more than $700,000 between 2001 and 2003, U.S. Attorney Christopher J. Christie announced.

U.S. District Judge Joseph E. Irenas also ordered Gerald Tauzier, 59, of Kenner, La., to pay $676,006 in restitution, in addition to the $101,000 Tauzier has already paid. Judge Irenas continued Tauzier’s release on a $100,000 bond pending his surrender on a date to be determined by the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

On Feb. 3, 2006, Tauzier pleaded guilty before Judge Irenas to a one-count Information charging wire fraud. Tauzier is the president and majority owner of Lee Medical International in Harahan, Louisiana, a distributor of health care products to hospitals, clinics and doctors’ offices.

Tauzier admitted that he had his company file reports with Johnson & Johnson in Piscataway that contained false information. Tauzier had Lee Medical file those false reports in order to get $777,006 in rebates from Johnson and Johnson to which Lee Medical was not entitled, according to Assistant U.S. Attorney Bohdan Vitvitsky.

As set forth in the Information and as Tauzier admitted during his plea hearing, Lee Medical purchased health care products such as vascular access devices manufactured by Johnson & Johnson. Johnson & Johnson had a practice of providing various rebates based on who the end user of its product was and based on what kind of contract that end user had with Johnson & Johnson.

Tauzier admitted that he had Lee Medical file reports with Johnson & Johnson in order to deceive J & J into thinking that J & J owed Lee Medical a rebate when, in fact, Lee Medical had not earned it. For example, in July 2002, Lee Medical forwarded a report to J & J claiming that Lee had sold vascular access devices to a Morehouse General Hospital in Louisiana when in fact those products had not been sold to that hospital.

In determining the actual sentence, Judge Irenas consulted the advisory U.S. Sentencing Guidelines, which provide appropriate sentencing ranges that take into account the severity and characteristics of the offense, the defendant's criminal history, if any, and other factors. The judge, however, was not bound by those guidelines in determining a sentence.

Parole has been abolished in the federal system. Defendants who are given custodial terms must serve nearly all that time.

Christie credited Special Agents from the FBI, under the direction of Leslie Wiser, Jr., Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s Newark Office, for developing the case against Tauzier.

The Government is represented by Assistant U.S. Attorney Bohdan Vitvitsky of the U.S. Attorney’s Securities and Health Care Fraud Unit in Newark.

Defense Counsel: Daniel E. Horgan, Esq. and Laurence R. Maddock, Esq. in Secaucus.