Dentist broke his patients’ teeth to make millions installing crowns, jury finds

The spit bowl needs to be prepared. This story will make you angry and leave a bad taste in your mouth.

A dentist in Wisconsin was found guilty of breaking his patients teeth with a drill so he could collect millions of dollars to fix the damage.

Scott Charmoli, a licensed dentist in Grafton, is accused of starting his scheme in 2015, when the number of crowns he installed suddenly increased. Charmoli installed more crowns in 2015 than he did in the previous year. His income increased by more than $1 million in the year after the royal boom, going from $1.4 million in the year before to $2.5 million in the year after.

According to federal prosecutors, Charmoli billed insurers and patients over $4 million for crown procedures. Charmoli was in the 95th percentile for the number of crowns installed by dentists in the state. An executive from a dental insurance company testified during Charmoli's four-day trial that Wisconsin dentists install fewer than six crowns per 100 patients in 2019. According to court documents, Charmoli installed over 800 crowns for his 1,131 patients, a rate of about 78 crowns per 100 patients.

Charmoli would take an X-ray or photograph of the patient's teeth, point out a faint line or spot on a healthy tooth, and tell the patient the bad news. Charmoli would use his drill to damage the healthy tooth after the patient agreed to the procedure. Charmoli would take another X-ray or photograph of the damage and submit it for insurance to justify the crown. Charmoli would install the crown.

Royal scam

Baily Bayer, a former assistant of Charmoli, testified during the hearing that she thought it was odd that the dentist took X-rays after he started drilling. Charmoli would say things like "insurance is going to want to see this" in order to justify the extra pictures.

After Charmoli stopped seeing patients, no one drilled down on what was really going on. Charmoli sold his practice to Major. Charmoli kept seeing his patients until August of 2019. Major said he only cracked the case when he started looking at the files of Charmoli's former patients.

Major wrote in the post that he felt the ethical obligation to report activity that he believed to be suspicious. He said he had no knowledge of the alleged actions of Dr. Charmoli.

A federal grand jury indicted Charmoli on December 15, 2020. According to The Washington Post, Charmoli owned vacation properties in Wisconsin and Arizona and his personal assets were worth more than $6 million.

Charmoli was found guilty of five counts of health care fraud and two counts of making false statements related to health care matters. Charmoli now faces a maximum of 10 years in prison for each count of health care fraud and a maximum of five years for each false statement conviction. His sentencing is in June. More than 100 former patients are also suing him.