Supervisor Of Drug Testing Facility Who Took Bribes To Falsify Over 100 Drug Tests Sentenced To Over Four Years In Federal Prison

Billy Joe West, 57, of Las Vegas, was sentenced today to four years and nine months in federal prison for soliciting and accepting bribes from convicted felons on federal supervised release in exchange for concealing their positive and missed drug tests, announced U.S. Attorney Nicholas A. Trutanich of the District of Nevada.

“In addition to violating federal law, the defendant’s breach of the public’s trust subverted the recovery and rehabilitation of many individuals undergoing court-ordered substance abuse treatment,” said U.S. Attorney Trutanich. “This reinforces why employees of federal contractors must put the public interest over their self interests.”

West pleaded guilty on June 1, 2020, to one count of prevention of communication of supervised release and probation violation. In addition to the term of imprisonment, U.S. District Judge Jennifer A. Dorsey sentenced West to three years of supervised release.

According to court documents and West’s admissions, his scheme caused over 100 false records to be made and reported to the U.S. Probation Office. West was a supervisor at WestCare Nevada, Inc., a federally contracted drug testing facility that conducted, among other services, court-ordered urinalysis drug testing of supervisees who are on federal probation and supervised release. West’s responsibilities included administering urinalysis drug testing.

Between June 21, 2018, and March 19, 2020, West misused his position as a supervisor and misled U.S. Probation Officers through a scheme to solicit and accept bribes from supervisees, in exchange for reporting false negative drug tests to the U.S. Probation Office. As a result of those false negative reports, probation officers were deceived into believing that certain supervisees were complying with court-ordered terms of their supervised release. But the supervisees had in fact violated terms of their supervised release by either missing mandatory drug tests or testing positive for controlled substances. Following West’s arrest in March 2020, the number of “no-shows” and positive drug test results that WestCare reported to the U.S. Probation Office increased.

This case was the product of an investigation by the FBI. Assistant U.S. Attorney Jessica Oliva prosecuted the case.