Lisa Phelan spoke to Global Competition Review about Florida-based oncologist William Harwin pleading guilty to a criminal charge of allocating cancer treatments with a rival more than eight months after the first prosecution resulted in a mistrial.
The jury broke for deliberations in the initial trial in 2020, but Hurricane Ian disrupted proceedings in Fort Myers for so long that the court declared a mistrial. While the court initially planned to hold the second trial by the end of 2022, that deadline was pushed back until September 2023. According to Lisa, this three-year delay from the indictment until the guilty plea might have motivated the Department of Justice's Antitrust Division to agree to a lighter sentence.
"The DOJ may not have offered that before, but given that the case and the evidence are getting 'stale' with the passage of time, they may have been willing to offer probation at this point to motivate a plea from Harwin and allow DOJ to move its resources on to other investigations and cases," Lisa said.
Lisa added that Harwin could have several reasons to plead guilty after initially fighting the charges including a likelihood of conviction, mounting legal bills, or just wanting to put this matter behind him.
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