Bellevue Man Sentenced for Fraud Related to Operation of Website Selling Counterfeit Drugs

United States Attorney Joe Kelly announced that Karl H. Goss, 72, of Bellevue, Nebraska, was sentenced on December 16, 2020 in federal court in Omaha for Wire Fraud.  Senior United States District Judge Joseph F. Bataillon sentenced Gross to one year and one day imprisonment. There is no parole in the federal system.  After his release from prison, he will begin a 3-year term of supervised release. Gross was also fined $10,000.

Gross operated an online business known as Amerisave from 2007 until 2016. Amerisave defrauded customers by marketing and selling misbranded and unapproved prescription medications or drugs. Advertising on the Amerisave website represented that medications and/or drugs received by customers were United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved drugs or manufactured in facilities which were FDA-approved or FDA-inspected facilities. The drugs, however, were not FDA-approved or FDA-inspected facilities. In order for customers to pay for their drugs from Amerisave, Amerisave communicated with customers via e-mail, facsimile and phone, and customers paid with credit cards. Amerisave had more than $2 million in sales in the time Gross operated it. To obtain foreign drugs, Gross, doing business as Amerisave, paid the foreign drug distributors via wire transfer. The funds were wired from First National Bank of Omaha to banks outside the United States. There were no identified victims in this case.

“American consumers rely on FDA oversight to ensure the safety and effectiveness of their prescription drugs. Selling misbranded and unapproved prescription drugs online that falsely claim to be FDA-approved puts consumers’ health at risk,” said Special Agent in Charge Charles L. Grinstead, FDA Office of Criminal Investigations Kansas City Field Office. “We will continue to investigate and bring to justice those who attempt to jeopardize public health and seek profit from potentially dangerous products.”

This case was investigated by the Food and Drug Administration Office of Criminal Investigations.