Posted on 02/21/2010 7:35:46 AM PST by Libloather
Detroit home health agency owner pleads guilty over Medicare fraud
18. February 2010 05:09
Detroit-area resident Muhammad Shahab pleaded guilty today for his role in organizing a Detroit-area home health care fraud scheme...
**SNIP**
Shahab, 50, pleaded guilty today to one count of conspiracy to commit health care fraud before U.S. District Judge Denise Page Hood of the Eastern District of Michigan. At sentencing, scheduled for June 17, 2010, Shahab faces a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
According to information contained in plea documents, Shahab helped finance and establish two Detroit-area home health agencies, Patient Choice Home Healthcare Inc. (Patient Choice), and All American Home Care Inc. (All American). Shahab admitted that while operating or being associated with both home health agencies, he and his co-conspirators billed Medicare for home health visits that never occurred.
Shahab admitted that he and his co-conspirators recruited and paid cash kickbacks and other inducements to Medicare beneficiaries, in exchange for the beneficiaries' Medicare numbers and signatures on documents falsely indicating that they had visited Patient Choice and All American for the purpose of receiving physical or occupational therapy. Shahab admitted that a large number of the beneficiaries were not homebound nor did they need any physical therapy services.
Shahab also admitted to securing physician referrals for medically unnecessary home health services through the payment of kickbacks to physicians or individuals associated with physicians. Shahab employed several physical therapists and physical therapy assistants to sign medical documentation necessary to begin billing for home health care services, including initial payments and payments for each visit to a Medicare beneficiary. Shahab admitted that he knew the physical therapists and physical therapy assistants were not actually conducting a large majority of the visits or treating a large majority of the patients. Shahab admitted to billing and receiving payment from Medicare for the services not rendered or medically unnecessary services.
Between approximately August 2007 and October 2009, Shahab and his co-conspirators at Patient Choice and All American submitted approximately $10,856,130 in claims to the Medicare program for physical and occupational therapy services that were never rendered or were medically unnecessary.
This case was prosecuted by Senior Trial Attorney John K. Neal and Trial Attorney Gejaa T. Gobena of the Criminal Division's Fraud Section. The case was investigated by the FBI and HHS-OIG. The case was brought as part of the Medicare Fraud Strike Force, supervised by the Criminal Division's Fraud Section and the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Michigan.
Since their inception in March 2007, Strike Force operations in seven districts have obtained indictments of more than 500 individuals who collectively have falsely billed the Medicare program for more than $1 billion. In addition, HHS's Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, working in conjunction with the HHS-OIG, are taking steps to increase accountability and decrease the presence of fraudulent providers.
Medicare for all!
Is this guy Amish or what?
$10,856,130 in claims and all he gets is a $250,000 fine. Crime definitely pays.
Think we need to bring back lynchings.
Yup. And guess who gets to pay.
The laws should be changed. People like this guy who are costing tax payers hundreds of billions of dollars every year, should have all their property and money SIEZED, in addition to spending the rest of their lives in jail, just like they do to drug barons.
This POS and his pals bilked Medicare for $1 billion, and they fine him $250,000? That's a joke right?
Would like to see the names of his co conspirators. Wonder if he used the muslim community to fleece us?
So how will Hussein intercede on his behalf?
Looks like this Muslim has assimilated (sarc)
Tip of the iceberg ping!
I submit that there are literally thousands of illegal activities involving medicare payments.
The truth is medicare and the medical system are not broke.
The system is being bled dry by crooks, and illegal aliens.
another shady example in my mind would be the scooter store.
There may be no illegal or crooked activity, but the mere hint is sufficent to warrant investigation. Now there is a reason for some job creation as fraud investigators.
Wonder what his birth name was?
Be sure you get a copy of your records first. Our Doc, is totally against obamadeathcare. He has put up a sign in his office that says if Medicare is your ONLY health ins. then you need to pay the part Medicare doesn't cover UP FRONT, or no appointment. It doesn't pay his overhead.
Rename, repackage, rewrite it a tad smaller, and sell another pig in a poke.
Tennessee has joined several other states in trying to pass a Health Care Freedom Act. NO COLAs for granny, retired Military or retired fed employees. BIG NEW fees for Tricare for Life retired over 65 Military's secondary health ins. (DOD bill already passed, delayed but goes into effect 2011)
New Dem mantra: Woof, woof eat dog food granny....ala let them eat cake.
Friday, February 19, 2010
Obama says slight fix will extend Social Security
http://townhall.com/news/us/2010/02/19/obama_says_slight_fix_will_extend_social_security
TRI CARE FOR LIFE This from a google search:
http://economicspolitics.blogspot.com/2009/05/tricare-for-life-is-obama-trying-to.html
This option would help reduce the costs of TFL, as well as costs for Medicare, by introducing minimum out-of pocket requirements for beneficiaries. Under this option, TFL would not cover any of the first $525 of an enrollee’s cost-sharing liabilities for calendar year 2011 and would limit coverage to 50 percent of the next $4,725 in Medicare cost sharing that the beneficiary incurred. (Because all further cost sharing would be covered by TFL, enrollees could not pay more than $2,888 in cost sharing in that year.)
http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/99xx/doc9925/12-18-HealthOptions.pdf
http://www.vawatchdog.org/09/hcva09/hcva110609-1.htm
Bill Would Restrict Veterans’ Health Care Options 11/06/09
Buyer and McKeon Offer Amendments to Protect Veterans and TRICARE Beneficiaries
Congress plans to block Tricare fee increases
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/10/military_tricarefees_blocked_100709w
By Rick Maze - Staff writer, Oct 7, 2009
Tricare fee increases imposed last week by the Defense Department will be repealed by a provision of the compromise 2010 defense authorization bill unveiled Wednesday by House and Senate negotiators.
Snip
The fee increases were announced on Sept. 30 and took effect on Oct. 1, but the defense bill, HR 2647, includes a provision barring any fee increases until the start of fiscal 2011.
Snip
Retired Army Maj. Gen. Bill Matz, president of the National Association for Uniformed Services, said the announcement of fee increases was shocking considering that the Obama administration promised earlier this year to hold off on any new fee Tricare fee increases until fiscal 2011.
“President Obama and DoD assured NAUS and the entire military family earlier this year that there would rightly be no increases in any Tricare fees” in fiscal 2010, Matz said. “We took them at their word, and I can’t believe that a co-pay increase like this was allowed to go forward,” he added.
Bambi doesn't keep his promises...so buyer beware.
That's a confusing sentence becuase it sounds like the patients went TO a facility vs. receiving care at home. A minor point in the reporting perhaps, but it still doesn't make sense.
So we have as listed co-conspirators Medicare aged beneficiaries, physicians, physical therapists and therapy assistants? Yet nobody blew the whistle until over 10 million in billing was racked up?
Hmm...sounds a bit unbelievable with all those parties involved and everybody keeping mum and working like a well-oiled machine. They had to have at minimum an annual inspection by the state inspectors to maintain licensure, maybe inconsistencies between billing and documention triggered the investigation. Or maybe somebody finaly blew a whistle.
Again...hmmm. If actually true as reported, there will be a lot of other people fined or jailed.
If it's any consolation, this sort of occurance is very much in a minority since Medicare cracked down on it's regulations and state supervision several years ago. Not that fraud doesn't occur, but at a significantly lower level than before.
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