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Category Archives: Health Care Fraud

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Notorious Nursing Home Operator Found Guilty

Posted in Health Care Fraud

George Houser of Atlanta was found guilty by Judge Harold Murphy following a month long trial in federal court in Rome, Georgia. Houser was found guilty of health care fraud for billing Medicare and Medicaid more than $32 million related worthless services in the operation of three nursing homes he ran in Rome and Brunswick, Georgia…. Continue Reading

Broward County, FL, Physician Acquitted on Kickback Charges

Posted in Acquittal, Health Care Fraud

Yesterday, a jury in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida returned not guilty verdicts against 78 year-old Francisco H. Gonzalez, M.D., on charges that Dr. Gonzalez allegedly took thousands in kickbacks from two Miami-area home healthcare agencies, ABC Home Health Care and Florida Home Health Providers (FHHP), according to the Miami Herald. Also… Continue Reading

Phony Doctor Indicted in Atlanta Federal Court for Fraudulently Billing Medicare

Posted in Health Care Fraud

Matthew Paul Brown, of Nashville, Tennessee, was indicted late last week in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia for allegedly persuading Atlanta area physicians to submit claims to Medicare, Medicaid and private insurers, according to an article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Brown, who is not licensed as a physician in Georgia,… Continue Reading

Prominent Cuban-American Acquitted of Healthcare Fraud in the 1990s, Indicted a Second Time for Submitting False Claims to Medicare

Posted in Fraud, Health Care Fraud

Ernesto Angel Montaner, aged 70, a member of a prominent Miami Cuban family, is facing healthcare fraud charges for the second time, according to the South Florida Sun Sentinel. Montaner was the sole defendant acquitted in a vast healthcare fraud prosecution in the 1990s for an alleged $15 million in false claims to Medicare.  The… Continue Reading

HHS/DOJ Report Provides Overview of Government’s Enforcement Efforts in Healthcare Sector

Posted in Health Care Fraud

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) released  their annual Health Care Fraud and Abuse Control Program (HCFAC) Report for fiscal year 2009 earlier this month, available in full here. DOJ and HHS jointly run HCFAC through the Inspector General of HCFAC. The Report provides a… Continue Reading

Johnson & Johnson Subsidiary Ortho-McNeil Pleads Guilty to Promoting Epilepsy Drug for Unapproved Uses; Settles Civil Suit for $75 Million

Posted in Health Care Fraud

Ortho-McNeil, a unit of Johnson and Johnson, entered a guilty plea on Tuesday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts to a misdemeanor for alleged illegal promoting of Topamax, a drug designed to treat epilepsy, for uses not approved by the Food and Drug Administration, according to PR Newswire. The government alleged that Ortho-McNeil… Continue Reading

Miami Man Receives 41 Months for $8 Million Fraud Against Medicare in South Georgia

Posted in Fraud, Health Care Fraud

  On Monday, Jose Garcia-Iglesias was sentenced to 41 months imprisonment in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Georgia as a result of a scheme to bill Medicare for $8 million in phantom infusion therapy services and cancer and AIDS medications, according to a press release. Garcia-Iglesias, who is from Miami, billed… Continue Reading

Adult Urinary Incontinence Supplies Fraud? DME Owner Pleads Guilty to Healthcare Fraud and Identity Theft

Posted in Fraud, Health Care Fraud

In another sign that nothing is sacred and no area safe from crime, even the adult undergarment industry has now been marred by fraud. Benjamin Essien, 34, owner and operator of Logic World Medical, a Houston-based durable medical equipment (DME) company, pled guilty to conspiracy to commit healthcare fraud, five counts of healthcare fraud and… Continue Reading

Baucus Healthcare Bill Amends Medicare Anti-Kickback Provision

Posted in Health Care Fraud

We at FCDB read H.R.3200, “America’s Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009,” earlier this year (well okay, perhaps we didn’t “read” it all, maybe skimmed is a better description) and were surprised to find that it appeared to add nothing to our nation’s ever-growing corpus of criminal provisions. Well, yesterday, Montana Senator Max Baucus released… Continue Reading

Pfizer Enters Largest Healthcare Fraud Settlement in U.S. History

Posted in False Claims, Fraud, Health Care Fraud, Money Laundering

Pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, inc., will pay $2.3 billion to the Federal government and 49 States to settle allegations that it violated federal regulations in promoting several drugs, as reported by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The settlement is the largest in U.S. history to date in a healthcare fraud case.  Georgia will receive $21.7 million as part of… Continue Reading