Texas chiropractor sentenced to 14 years for FECA workers' comp kickback scheme
Garry Wayne Craighead, a Texas chiropractor, formed Union Treatment Centers (UTC) in 2007 and, from 2011 through 2014, opened clinics under various names across Dallas-Fort Worth, San Antonio, Austin, Corpus Christi, Killeen and Weslaco. Craighead courted claimants covered by the Federal Employees' Compensation Act (FECA), federal employees of agencies including the Bureau of Prisons, the Department of the Army, the Department of Veterans Affairs, the US Postal Service and Customs and Border Protection, building relationships with union leaders inside those agencies to steer a steady flow of injured federal workers to UTC. Craighead then referred those claimants to pharmacies, hospitals, surgical clinics and doctor specialists of his choosing in exchange for monthly kickbacks, processed through his own consulting company, CCM&D Consulting. From January 2007 through July 2014, UTC and its related entities billed the Department of Labor's Office of Workers' Compensation Programs (OWCP) more than $203 million, of which OWCP paid more than $98 million. Craighead pleaded guilty in December 2015 to soliciting and receiving illegal remunerations in federal health programs and to engaging in monetary transactions in property derived from unlawful activity. On June 10, 2016, he was sentenced to 168 months (14 years) in federal prison and ordered to pay approximately $18 million in restitution to the Department of Labor, and to forfeit land in Williamson County, Texas, and a Mooney M20J aircraft.
- Year
- 2016
- Where
- United States
- Outcome
- Sentenced
- Reported loss
- $98.0 million
- Victims
- Not stated in the sources
- Schemes
- Workers' comp kickback fraud
- Last reviewed
- 2026-10-26
The facts, as recorded
- Garry Wayne Craighead formed Union Treatment Centers (UTC) in 2007 and, from 2011 through 2014, opened clinics under various names, including GreenTree Health, Creekside Surgical, Creekside Diagnostics, New Help and CCM&D Consulting, across Dallas-Fort Worth, San Antonio, Austin, Corpus Christi, Killeen and Weslaco, Texas.
- Craighead courted claimants covered by the Federal Employees' Compensation Act, employees of the Bureau of Prisons, the Department of the Army, the Department of Veterans Affairs, the US Postal Service and Customs and Border Protection, building relationships with union leaders inside those agencies to steer referrals to UTC.
- Craighead referred FECA claimants to pharmacies, hospitals, surgical clinics and doctor specialists of his choosing in exchange for monthly kickbacks, processed through his consulting company, CCM&D Consulting.
- From January 2007 through July 2014, UTC and its related entities billed the Department of Labor's Office of Workers' Compensation Programs more than $203 million, of which OWCP paid more than $98 million.
- Craighead pleaded guilty on December 4, 2015, to one count of soliciting and receiving illegal remunerations in federal health programs and one count of engaging in monetary transactions in property derived from specified unlawful activity.
- On June 10, 2016, Craighead was sentenced to 168 months (14 years) in federal prison and ordered to pay approximately $18 million (specifically $17,908,170) in restitution to the Department of Labor.
- Craighead was also ordered to forfeit land in Williamson County, Texas, and a Mooney M20J aircraft.
- Two Houston-area pharmacists separately admitted paying Craighead kickbacks, from March through December 2015, to refer injured federal workers to their pharmacies; the government later filed a civil suit seeking to recover $3.5 million the government had paid those two pharmacists.
Why this case matters
Pacific Hospital and Grusd’s companies were the facilities paying kickbacks outward to the doctors who sent them patients. Craighead shows the same fraud from the other side: he was the referring provider, and he took the kickbacks, from the pharmacies, hospitals and surgical clinics he chose to send federal employees to.
A captive referral base
FECA gives injured federal employees one government-run benefit program, not a market of insurers to choose between. Craighead exploited that structure directly, cultivating relationships with union leaders inside agencies like the Bureau of Prisons and the Postal Service to build a renewable pipeline of referrals, rather than having to win over private physicians one at a time.
A gap between billed and paid
UTC’s entities billed the Office of Workers’ Compensation Programs more than $203 million but were actually paid more than $98 million, a reminder that even a federal benefit program’s own payment review catches and reduces a large share of fraudulent billing before it pays out, long before any criminal case is ever brought.
The caveat
Garry Wayne Craighead pleaded guilty in December 2015 and was sentenced in June 2016; this is a completed criminal case, not an allegation. The two Houston-area pharmacists described above admitted paying Craighead kickbacks as part of their own, separate pleas; the $3.5 million figure relates to a later civil suit seeking repayment from those pharmacists specifically, not an additional criminal finding against Craighead himself.
Sources
- OIG Investigations Newsletter, Volume V, June 1 - July 31, 2016. US Department of Labor, Office of Inspector General. Accessed 2026-10-26. Supports: Craighead's identity as former chiropractor and owner of Union Treatment Centers, the June 10, 2016 sentence of 168 months and approximately $18 million restitution, the forfeiture of Williamson County land and a Mooney M20J aircraft, the 2007 to 2014 scheme period, the clinic names and Texas cities, the FECA claimant recruitment from federal agencies, the kickback mechanism through CCM&D Consulting, and the more than $203 million billed and more than $98 million paid by OWCP.