Surely some of the doctors who prescribe unnecessary pain medications and hook hundreds of thousands of Americans on drugs are American born and bred, but check out this story from Michigan in December.
Not only did these ‘new American’ doctors and health professionals turn unsuspecting Americans into drug addicts, but they did it by using your taxpayer dollars in multi-million dollar fraud schemes involving Medicare and Medicaid.
They got rich destroying lives!
And, when they got caught, many fled the country!
From the Detroit News:
Rich and on the run: Doctors flee country amid fraud, opioid crackdown
Detroit — More than a dozen doctors and medical professionals charged with federal crimes locally have fled the country in recent years amid a federal crackdown on illegal opioid use and health care fraud.
Prosecutors used the fugitive status of 16 medical professionals who have fled since 2011 to keep Dr. Rajendra Bothra jailed Wednesday while he awaits trial in a nearly $500 million conspiracy, one of the largest health care fraud cases in U.S. history.
Here is a bit more, but please read the shocking story!
The medical professionals who have fled for overseas destinations including Jordan, Pakistan and Egypt in recent years have two things in common: foreign ties and big bank accounts that have financed flights from justice. In Bothra’s case, he has eight siblings in India and amassed a $35 million fortune and vast-real estate holdings, including a $1.99 million island estate.
More here.
In case you have forgotten, last summer then Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced the largest healthcare bust of Medicare and Medicaid fraud scammers in US history and linked it to the opioid crisis.
Medicare Fraud Strike Force
To help find and prosecute frauds and crooks, the feds established the Medicare Fraud Strike Force involving a coordinated effort between the Fraud Section of the US Justice Department, US Attorney’s offices, the FBI, the Department of Health and Human Services Inspector General and local law enforcement.
I bet you’ve never even heard of it because the national media rarely (if ever!) mentions its work, which the Strike Force says has resulted in successful prosecutions of 4,000 defendants who have collectively billed the Medicare program for more than $14 billion.
In addition to the Detroit area, the Strike Force is operating in 12 locations around the US: Miami, FL, Los Angeles, CA, Houston, TX, Brooklyn, NY, Baton Rouge and New Orleans, LA, Tampa and Orlando, FL, Chicago, IL, Dallas, TX, Washington, DC, Newark, NJ, Philadelphia, PA and the Appalachian Region.
I wonder why these huge Medicare and Medicaid fraud stories never seem to be front page news across the country and why aren’t they widely reported by cable news?
