Ex-AZ exec arrested for having AZ cover $400,000 in home improvements

While drugmakers have often been accused of ignoring laws to benefit their bottom lines, one drugmaker is now on the flip side of that kind of deal. A former AstraZeneca ($AZN) employee has managed to find a creative way to give himself a $400,000 bonus: He had a contractor for the company make improvements to his home. Delaware online reports that Mitchell E. Guard, 45, an AstraZeneca project engineer at its headquarters in Fairfax, DE, is accused of having a contractor who did work on the AstraZeneca campus send workers to his house and then charge the company. Guard approved the invoices until the company got wind of the practice. Contractor David Ragolia was also arrested. The work was quite extensive. According to the Delaware online, improvements included a new sunroom, updated kitchen and replacement of a two-car garage with a three-car garage. There was also a basement refinishing, new exterior siding and windows, some bathroom fixtures and new air conditioning and heating system. Of course, the drugmaker has had its own run-ins with the legal system. In 2010, for example, it paid $520 million to settle allegations that it had inappropriately marketed off-label uses of its psychotropic drug Seroquel, targeting doctors who did not normally prescribe the drug. Story | More