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.

Brody signed prescriptions for 394,324 Schedule II pills for members he never met. Auto-refill continued through psychiatric holds and after some patients died. The jury used platform design itself as evidence of the conspiracy.

What the Government Is Actually Building

The significant move is who got charged. The Justice Department's Health Care Fraud Unit went past the prescribers and built its case against the corporate decisionmakers who designed the platform. The government's theory was that the technology itself, the compensation structure, and the clinical protocols were the instruments of the conspiracy. The Assistant Attorney General called the sentence a warning to every digital health boardroom, and that language was chosen deliberately.

This is also the first sentence announced from the West Coast Strike Force, the newest addition to a strike force program that has charged more than 6,200 defendants tied to over $45 billion in fraudulent billing since 2007. That program was born in South Florida, and the Southern District of Florida remains its busiest territory. Any telehealth operation with Florida patients, prescribers, or billing should assume this playbook is available to prosecutors here. For a physician federal investigation defense, a DEA registrant defense, or the white collar defense attorney advising a digital health board, the lesson is the same: the government now reads product features as evidence of intent.

The West Coast Strike Force produced this sentence. The Southern District of Florida — where the strike force program began — remains the busiest health care fraud district in the country. The same charging framework is available to prosecutors here.

Exposure and Charges

The statutes in this case carry serious weight. Distribution of a Schedule II controlled substance under 21 U.S.C. § 841 carries up to 20 years per count, and a § 846 conspiracy carries the same penalties as the object offense. Health care fraud under 18 U.S.C. § 1347 carries up to 10 years per count, more if patients are seriously harmed. Conspiracy to obstruct justice under 18 U.S.C. § 1512 adds up to 20 more.

The guideline drivers are drug quantity, fraud loss, aggravating role, and obstruction enhancements, and they stack quickly for executives. What the government must prove on the drug counts matters just as much. After the Supreme Court's decision in Ruan v. United States, a conviction for unlawful prescribing requires proof that the defendant subjectively knew or intended that prescriptions were issued without a legitimate medical purpose or outside the usual course of professional practice. That intent standard is where a 21 U.S.C. § 841 prescribing defense lives or dies. At Done, internal messages describing stimulants as candy handed out like Santa Claus did the government's work for it.

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).

The pre-indictment window is where intent arguments, drug quantity disputes, and cooperation decisions are built. Waiting for an indictment surrenders the ground where these cases are actually won.

Why Timing Matters Right Now

The arc of this case ran four years: an airport interception in February 2023, arrest in June 2024, trial conviction in November 2025, sentencing in July 2026. The decisions that determined the outcome were made in the earliest months, before anyone was charged. DOJ has told the digital health industry that platform design is on the table as conspiracy evidence, and the National Fraud Enforcement Division created in April 2026 has nine strike forces and new funding behind that message. Telehealth companies prescribing controlled substances are receiving subpoenas today, while federal telemedicine prescribing rules under 21 U.S.C. § 829(e) remain in transition. If your company touches this space in Florida, the window for federal investigation defense is open now. It closes at indictment.

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.