Winston Secures Dismissal of Criminal Charges of US$158M in Health Care Fraud Against Dentist Client on Eve of Five-Week Trial

We defended Dr. Leyla Nourian against charges of conspiring to commit US$158M in health care fraud and money laundering. The trial was set for October 2022 in the Northern District of Texas. On behalf of Dr. Nourian, we negotiated relentlessly before trial with the DOJ to seek resolution of the case that would eliminate any risk that Dr. Nourian would face prison time. To that end, we provided the government with evidence from a handwriting expert showing Dr. Nourian had not participated in the scheme and that her signature had been forged.

After rejecting a plea offer from the DOJ and just one week before a five-week trial in a much-reported win, we obtained a full dismissal of all criminal charges against Dr. Nourian by DOJ.

When the charges were dismissed, Winston’s lead lawyer said, “The government most times would rather lose a case than dismiss a case,” further noting that the DOJ doesn’t “like to admit that they shouldn’t have indicted someone.”

Impact

The significance of this win to Dr. Nourian was three-fold: 1) it ended the criminal prosecution against her, 2) it freed her from facing up to 10 years in prison, 3) it enabled our client to clear her reputation and start to rebuild her practice.

(U.S.A. v. Jamshid Noryian, et al. (Case No. 3:17-cr-00155, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas))