LAWYER IN LAB FRAUD SCAM GIVES UP LICENSE

A Boca Raton lawyer who has admitted he participated in a health care fraud scheme at a Palm Beach Gardens lab owned by a former Florida Marlins pitcher is among the attorneys recently disciplined by the Florida Supreme Court.

Lawrence Weisberg, who pleaded guilty in August in U.S. District Court to a charge of money laundering, agreed to give up his license to practice law. Noting that his action is the equivalent of a disbarment, the high court accepted his petition last week.

In addition to Weisberg, the high court also reprimanded Delray Beach attorney S. Tracy Long in a separate case.

Long, who has been practicing in Florida since 1990, failed to communicate with a wife after he agreed to represent her and her husband in a foreclosure case. The wife was unaware of the foreclosure or that Long was representing her, according to the Florida Bar.

The Supreme Court agreed that Long should be publicly reprimanded for the oversight.

Smart Lab is owned by former Marlins pitcher Justin Wayne and his brother Hawkeye Hamilton Wayne, who was also a professional baseball player. The Waynes have also pleaded guilty to charges in connection with what prosecutors described as a $3 million scheme to defraud insurers. They are to be sentenced Nov. 1. The brothers and Weisberg remain free on bond.

As part of the scheme, Smart Lab officials paid Kenny Chatman kickbacks and bribes to provide urine samples from residents of his sober homes for testing, federal prosecutors said. Chatman is serving a 27-year prison sentence after admitting he turned some of the residents of his homes into prostitutes and defrauded the health care system.

The two Palm Beach County attorneys are among 12 attorneys disciplined by the Supreme Court in the past month, according to the Florida Bar.