A Six-Year Sentence for a Telehealth CEO: What the Done Global Adderall Case Means for Florida Digital Health Founders and Prescribers

A telehealth CEO who never treated a single patient is starting a six-year federal prison sentence. On July 7, 2026, Ruthia He, founder and former CEO of Done Global Inc., was sentenced in the Northern District of California for building a subscription platform that prosecutors treated as a drug distribution operation: more than 37 million Adderall pills, over $12 million taken from insurers, and now a $1 million fine on top of the prison term. David Brody, the company's clinical president, received two years. If you found, fund, advise, or prescribe for a digital health company, this case is the government's new enforcement blueprint, and it reads directly onto Florida.

Ruthia He received 72 months and a $1 million fine on July 7, 2026. David Brody, the clinical president, received 24 months. Neither was a treating clinician. Both were convicted under drug distribution statutes.

Key Takeaways

• Done Global's founder received 72 months and a $1 million fine on July 7, 2026; the clinical president received 24 months.
• The jury convicted both defendants on drug counts under 21 U.S.C. § 841 and § 846, not only health care fraud under 18 U.S.C. § 1347.
• Prosecutors used platform design, auto-refill features, and clinician pay structures as conspiracy evidence, the framework long used against pill mills.
• The sentence is the first from DOJ's new West Coast Strike Force; Florida providers already operate inside the nation's original strike force territory.
• Post-subpoena conduct, encrypted apps, deleted messages, and offshore transfers produced a separate obstruction conviction. Early counsel prevents exactly those mistakes.

What Actually Happened

Done Global sold ADHD treatment by monthly subscription. The company spent more than $40 million on social media advertising that told ordinary adults their distraction was ADHD and that Adderall was the answer. Behind the app, the government proved a machine built to move pills: initial evaluations capped at half the length of a standard psychiatric visit, clinicians paid up to $60,000 per month when they signed Adderall prescriptions every 30 seconds, and an auto-refill feature that let patients collect Schedule II stimulants for years without ever seeing a clinician. According to the DOJ sentencing announcement, refills continued through involuntary psychiatric holds and, in some instances, after patients had died.

Brody, the clinical president, personally signed prescriptions for 394,324 Schedule II pills for 6,559 Done members he never met and whose records he never opened. A November 2025 jury convicted both defendants of one count of conspiracy to distribute controlled substances under 21 U.S.C. § 846, four counts of distribution under 21 U.S.C. § 841, and conspiracy to commit health care fraud under 18 U.S.C. § 1349. He was separately convicted of conspiracy to obstruct justice. The fraud counts rested on false prior authorization submissions that pulled roughly $12.3 million out of Medicare, Medicaid, and commercial insurers.

The Mistakes That Turned a Business Case Into a Prison Case

The trial record is a catalog of unforced errors committed after the investigation began. Once the grand jury subpoena arrived, the CEO moved company business onto Signal and WhatsApp, turned on disappearing messages, deleted documents, transferred millions abroad through a shell company, and researched countries without extradition treaties. Each act became trial evidence, and together they produced a separate obstruction conviction and a longer sentence.

Most people under federal investigation make quieter versions of the same mistakes: talking to agents at the door without counsel, producing documents with no litigation hold and no privilege review, assuming only the prescriber with the DEA registration is exposed, and waiting for an indictment before hiring a federal criminal defense attorney. By the time charges are filed, the record is already built.

Strategic Defense: Where These Cases Are Won

Telehealth prescribing cases are won early or not at all. The first task for a pre-indictment defense lawyer is establishing whether the client is a witness, a subject, or a target, and a federal target letter attorney can usually get that answer quickly. The second is preservation: a clean, documented litigation hold, handled by counsel, is the cheapest insurance in federal practice. Federal grand jury subpoena defense is about controlling the production, protecting privilege, and opening a channel to the prosecutors while charging decisions are still fluid.

On the merits, the line between an aggressive telehealth model and a criminal one is real and defensible: genuine initial evaluations, documented clinical judgment, clinician authority to discharge patients, and compensation that does not reward volume of controlled substance prescriptions. A telemedicine fraud attorney who understands both the medicine and the guidelines can often present that record to the government before indictment and change the outcome. Where charges do come, the fight moves to intent under Ruan, drug quantity, loss calculation, and role, and then to sentencing mitigation under 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a).

Facing a federal telehealth or controlled substance investigation in Florida? These cases move quietly at first: a subpoena, an agent's visit, a records request from a payor. The earliest response usually shapes the outcome more than anything later in a courtroom. If you or your loved ones have been arrested or are under federal investigation for telehealth or controlled substance charges, call Aaron M. Cohen, 24 hours a day to get help.

AMC Defense Law represents executives, physicians, and digital health companies in federal investigations and prosecutions in Florida and nationwide, with the discretion these matters require. Consultations are confidential.

This article is provided for general informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Reading this article does not create an attorney-client relationship with AMC Defense Law. Every case is different, and outcomes depend on specific facts and circumstances. If you are facing a federal investigation or criminal charges, consult a qualified attorney about your particular situation.