“We had $280 in our pocket, two suitcases, nothing else, no language and a 3 year old,” Roman said. “It was a very hard start, as usual and normal for immigrants.”

Now, after 17 years of being in business, Roman is at risk of losing it all if his $2.5 million lawsuit against the insurance company Healthfirst fails.

When Roman was asked where everything started to go wrong, he immediately slumped back into his chair, let out long sigh, paused and said, “I hired the former Assemblyman Alec Brook-Krasny.”

Brook-Krasny, who was the first Soviet-Born person to become a member of the NYS Assembly, represented South Brooklyn neighborhoods from Bay Ridge to Coney Island. In June 2015, he abruptly resigned from office to take a position with QLS.

On April 13, 2017 Brook-Krasny was arrested as part of a sting by Office of the Special Narcotics Prosecutor for NYC that had been investigating Dr. Lazar Feygin, who allegedly ran two “pill mills” that were accused of dumping $6.3 million in narcotics onto the black market.

Brook-Krasny was allegedly helping doctors scrub urinalysis tests of incriminating results to keep patients from being flagged for drinking alcohol while taking opioids, and was one of 12 defendants charged. He also faced charges for bribery, which prosecutors have already agreed should be reduced, according to a report by the New York Law Journal.

Nobody else from QLS was charged with a crime or implicated in the scheme. According to Ramon, prosecutors told him that the sting began before Brook-Krasny went to work for QLS, and that he did not have the capacity within the company to do what he was accused of.

“This had nothing to do with us,” said Alexander Kharaz, Roman’s son, a former Brooklyn assistant district attorney who now serve as QLS’s chief operating officer. “We got through seven inspections. This was a four-year, wiretap investigation and there was nothing on us.”

In between QLS hiring Brook-Krasny and Brook-Krasny getting arrested, he negotiated a contract with Healthfirst. Within two weeks of Brook-Krasny’s arrest, Healthfirst put QLS on probation that included a “prepayment review program.” Within three months, Healthfirst broke their contract with QLS.

When the Brooklyn Eagle reached out to an attorney for Healthfirst with questions about why it broke the contract and they refused to comment. The spokesperson also refused to answer questions about whether or not it felt the laboratory had committed fraud.

While in the probationary period, and since, QLS has billed approximately $2.5 million in services rendered to Healthfirst. Roman claims that QLS has not received any money at all from Healthfirst since two weeks after Brook-Krasny was arrested.

After multiple attempts at negotiating a settlement without response from Healthfirst, QLS hired Abrams Fensterman to file a $2.5 million lawsuit. Attorneys for QLS alleged that this is part of a scheme to fix market prices and have accused Healthfirst of taking advantage of QLS while it was in a precarious situation.

“Healthfirst is conspiring with Quest Diagnostic and Labcorp to establish those companies as the exclusive providers of clinical laboratory services within Healthfirst’s network,” read the complaint filed by QLS’s attorneys. “Exclusivity would allow Healthfirst to control pricing for clinical laboratory testing, while providing Quest Diagnostic and Labcorp with a higher volume of business and reduced pressure from competitors like QLS.”

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