SARASOTA, FL. – Michael Dattoli, 64, of Anna Maria, has been arrested and is facing multiple charges of obtaining a controlled substance by fraud, criminal use of personal identification information, and false and fraudulent insurance claims.
Dattoli was arrested by Sarasota Police officers on Thursday, December 16, 2021.
In August 2021, Sarasota Police officers spoke with investigators with the Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office Pharmaceutical Diversion Unit regarding a prescription fraud case that happened in 2019 and 2020 involving a victim and Dr. Michael Dattoli.
Investigators with SCSO said that two of the pharmacies involved were in the City of Sarasota. The prescriptions were for Diazepam (Valium), a controlled substance. They were filled three times in the City of Sarasota under Dattoli’s wife’s name.
In September 2021, Sarasota Police officers were able to obtain copies of multiple prescriptions from several local pharmacies that were phoned-in throughout 2020 by the Dattoli Cancer Center. The prescriptions were filled and picked up the same day in 2020 by Dattoli who provided his driver’s license as identification.
The victim, who worked at the Dattoli Cancer for approximately five years, left the center at the end of 2020. The victim told Sarasota Police officers that during a check of his Florida prescription drug controlled substance database in September 2021, he noticed several fraudulent prescriptions were written in 2020.
Three of the fraudulent prescriptions were written to Dattoli’s wife and he never saw her as a patient. The victim was shown a copy of the phoned-in prescriptions during his interview with Sarasota Police and said he never authorized the prescription and said Dattoli’s wife was never a patient of his.
In October 2021, Sarasota Police officers interviewed Dattoli’s wife. She said she had never been a patient at the center, advised the prescription was not hers and she has never taken the medications in question.
In November 2021, Sarasota Police officers subpoenaed bank records that matched accounts belonging to Dattoli, with the same address as the Dattoli Cancer Center and the same social security number as Dattoli. The bank records showed the same dates, total purchase price, and stores where fraudulent prescriptions were filled, picked up, and purchased by Dattoli.
In December 2021, Sarasota Police officers subpoenaed documentation from the Florida Blue insurance company. It showed Dattoli was a policyholder for an account with them and his wife was a dependent for the policy. In the paperwork from Florida Blue, the fraudulent prescriptions for Diazepam in June 2020, August 2020, and October 2020 for Dattoli’s wife were listed as being submitted.
The paperwork from Florida Blue provided Dattoli’s biographical information, the date the prescriptions were filled, the doctor prescribing them who is the victim, and additional information.
Dattoli is being charged with three counts of obtaining a controlled substance by fraud (Diazepam), three counts of criminal use of personal identification information, and three counts of insurance fraud. Dattoli is currently being held at the Sarasota County Jail.
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