Government
First person convicted of HIPAA violation gets jail time
NEWS IN BRIEF — Posted Dec. 13, 2004
A federal judge in November sentenced the first person to be convicted under the privacy provisions of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 to 16 months in prison and three years of supervised release, according to the U.S. Attorney's office for the Western District of Washington.
Richard W. Gibson, 42, of SeaTac, Wash., also will have to pay more than $9,000 in restitution for wrongfully disclosing an individual's identifiable information for economic gain. Gibson, while employed at the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance, used a patient's name, date of birth and Social Security number to get four credit cards.
He used the cards to buy more than $9,000 worth of video games, jewelry, groceries and other items.
Note: This item originally appeared at http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2004/12/13/gvbf1213.htm.
