The Southern Illinoisan

BY Jim Muir
THE SOUTHERN

BENTON - Benton dentist Dr. W. David Rommel was sentenced to 63 months in federal prison and ordered to repay $827,000 to the Illinois Department of Public Aid during a sentencing hearing Tuesday morning in U.S. District Court in Benton.

Rommel, 56, who practiced in Benton for nearly a decade, was found guilty in a jury trial last July on multiple counts of mail fraud and a single count of healthcare fraud.

Rommel was arrested in December 2003 and accused of engaging in a series of actions with the intent to defraud public aid. Those acts included performing and attempting to perform unnecessary dental procedures on healthy teeth and billing for procedures that were either not performed or were not performed as he claimed.