Ruben Rodriguez and Maria Victoria Suarez – a married couple from Coral Gables – have run afoul of the law on more than one occasion over the past year, and the duo’s luck seems to be getting even worse. The two entered a plea agreement in US District Court yesterday for their involvement in a scheme whereby they stole patient records from Jackson Memorial Hospital and attempted to sell the data to personal injury lawyers in the Miami area.
Unfortunately for the Florida couple, US District Judge Joan Lenard rejected the plea offer. Claiming that the scheme hatched by the two – and the subsequent punishment agreed to by the US Attorney’s office – did not match the magnitude of the crime, Lenard has delayed the plea deal until she can review the sentencing guidelines for the crimes Rodriguez and Suarez have been charged with.
According to a report by the Miami Herald, during yesterday’s hearing the judge claimed “these charges are much too serious – much too serious for our community”, adding that “violations of the law in the healthcare industry have become too much the norm”. The Herald reports that Lenard said the charges here were too serious for her to accept the plea agreement, “not when all these victims were involved”.
Under terms of the plea agreement, Rodriguez was slated to serve up to 12 years in prison, while his wife, Maria Victoria Suarez, could face up to five years behind bars.
As previously reported by Infosecurity, Rodriguez and Suarez were also indicted by the US Attorney’s office this past March as a result of a scheme in which the husband-and-wife team stole personal privacy data from a local ambulance service, American Medical Response, and then sold the information to personal injury lawyers in the vicinity.