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TALLAHASSEE -- Attorney General Bob Butterworth today charged Eckerd Drug Stores with fraudulently billing Florida's Medicaid program more than $3 million.

The charge is contained in a civil complaint filed jointly in federal court in Tampa by Butterworth, the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Middle District of Florida. The complaint seeks triple the amount of monetary damages and penalties of up to $10,000 for each fraudulent bill submitted by the company.

According to the complaint, Eckerd has received more than $11.5 million since 1986 from federal and state public health care programs for medications the company did not provide to program recipients. Of that amount, approximately $3.3 million was received from Florida's Medicaid program.

Butterworth said the excessive payments stemmed from the practice of Eckerd pharmacists partially filling drug prescriptions but charging the health care programs the cost of full prescriptions.

"Citing insufficient stock, Eckerd pharmacists would often provide only a portion of the prescribed drugs and tell the recipient to return in a day or two for the rest," Butterworth said. "The cost of a full prescription would be charged to the program, but in many instances the recipient would not return to get the remainder of the drugs."

In those cases, Butterworth said, Eckerd did not reimburse the programs but rather pocketed the difference in cost between providing a full prescription and a partial prescription.

Butterworth noted that Eckerd issued partial prescriptions to cash customers as well as public health care program recipients, but in those cases only charged for the amount of drugs actually provided.

The case is being handled for Florida by Medicaid Fraud Control Unit Director Mark Schlein and Assistant Attorney General Todd Grandy.