By Alex Moore
According to court documents and an FBI press release, the defendants are accused of submitting false claims to Medicare for the reimbursement of over-the-counter COVID-19 test kits, which were supposedly provided to Medicare beneficiaries. The owners and operators of purported medical laboratories rarely provided the COVID tests to actual Medicare recipients, says the FBI, which insists that the accused instead submitted reimbursement claims for people who hadn’t requested test kits or were deceased. The defendants allegedly paid a marketing company to provide the names of hundreds of thousands of Medicare beneficiaries to use in their fraudulent claims.
The two men even had well-laid plans to cover their tracks. According to court documents, they installed foreign nationals as nominal owners at their purported laboratories to submit fraudulent Medicare claims, with the nominal owners understanding that they would flee the country if they learned their laboratory was under investigation.
They almost got away with their accused crimes, too. Medicare paid approximately $136 million in claims, out of the $227 million billed. However, they will now face prosecution.
"The overwhelming fraud uncovered in this investigation details a blatant disregard for America's critical health care program, Medicare, and puts all patients at risk," said Douglas S. DePodesta of the FBI’s Chicago Field Office, in a press statement. “The FBI and our partners will not tolerate anyone who abuses the health care system for personal gain and will aggressively pursue justice on behalf of both patients and taxpayers.”
