Donna Woods Gets 7 Years For Stealin' From Students Then Gets A Schoolboard Bonus For Doing It

After her conviction, before sentencing, she went back to the school board, who then, approved a pay bonus.

Public schools do not do bonuses, but private schools do.

And, to think, we have yet to get to Detroit.

Bethany Christian over there at Covenat House - Southwest Detroit, through Grand Valley State University, has all kinds of these fraud schemes going on, but the worst part is not that these people are fraudulently billing Medicaid through fictitious programs, where they got a corporal punishment social worker who should not be around any children or youth, but the fact that the schools uses her to generate fake ass Medicaid billing for programs and services that do not exist.

Yes, I said that, again, because that school is being used to re-segregate, for fraudulent billing purposes, of course.

Praise the lord, the school's motto...clearly posted in the school office.

Dallas Charter School CEO Donna Woods Sentenced To More Than 7 Years In Prison For Role In Kickback Scheme

In October, a federal jury found Nova Academy CEO Donna H. Woods, 65, guilty of one count of conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud, and three individual counts of wire fraud.

That same month, the CBS 11 I-Team uncovered that Woods returned to Nova Academy after her conviction.

After her conviction, the Nova Academy school board gave Woods a $20,000 bonus.

The federal judge on Thursday called the bonus “outrageous” and indicative of the management of the taxpayer-funded charter school.

U.S. District Judge Sidney A. Fitzwater sentenced Woods to 87 months in federal prison and ordered her to pay $337,951.06 in restitution to the Federal Communications Commission, U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas Erin Nealy Cox’s office explained in a news release.

Woods’s co-conspirator, Donatus Anyanwu, 61, pleaded guilty to conspiracy in July. Judge Fitzwater sentenced him to 30 months in prison and declared him jointly and severally liable for the restitution owed to the FCC Thursday.

According to evidence presented at trial, Woods approved the granting of a federal telecommunications E-rate contract, worth approximately $337,951, to ADI Engineering, a company owned by Dr. Anyanwu.

In return for the E-rate contract, Anyanwu paid Woods $50,000 in kickbacks.

When the charter school initially selected another contractor for E-rate, prosecutors explained, Woods filed a falsified E-rate application re-directing the contract to ADI – despite the company’s shoddy record. To ensure that ADI’s bid was accepted by E-rate program managers, Woods also allowed Dr. Anyanwu to copy portions of the original winning bid and pass off the work as his own.

Then, when, ADI botched the E-rate job, Woods falsely certified that it had completed the work when it had not.

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DOJ: United States Files False Claims Act Complaint Against Community Health Network - Medicaid Fraud In Indiana Under Emperor Pence

If I believe what is reported by Wikipedia, Mike Pence was Governor of Indiana before he was Errant Empereor of the United States.

If I close my eyes really, really hard, I can recall Emperor Pence signing the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), because it came out Michigan and I just happen to know one of the writers, super duper, really well, which brings me to a dream sequence of why the Detroit Economic Club and the Michigan Economic Development Authority embraced him, the glorious leader of the Indiana Economic Development Authority, so warmly, but hey, what do I know?

I know nothing because the case is still under seal.

What I do know is that I know about the qui tam and the False Claims Act, when dealing with Medicaid Fraud in Child Welfare and the Indianapolis Land Bank, including its marvelous artifices & machinations of stealin' the children, land & votes, just like the Detroit Land Bank Authority.

I also know that you cannot be prosecuted for Medicaid Fraud in Child Welfare, under the FCA when you use your RFRA get out of jail for stealin' card when you do it in the name of the tax exempt god, because that is why it was created.

Parental Rights for Corporations.

Cocktails & Popcorn: Pence Came To Detroit To Cover Up The War Crimes Of Jeffrey Epstein - Detroit Land Bank Authority, Dan Gilbert, Mike Duggan, Children's Trust Funds & Skadden

The United States has filed a complaint against Community Health Network Inc. (Community) in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana, the Department of Justice announced today.  Community, an integrated health care system in central Indiana, is alleged to have violated the Stark Law and thereby submitted false claims to the Medicare program.  

The Stark Law prohibits a hospital from billing Medicare for services referred by a physician with whom the hospital has an improper financial relationship that does not meet any statutory or regulatory exception.  The government’s complaint alleges that Community had employment relationships with a number of physicians that did not meet any Stark Law exception because the compensation Community paid to the physicians was well above fair market value and because Community conditioned paying bonuses on physicians achieving a minimum target of referral revenues to the hospital.  The complaint alleges that Community received referrals from these physicians in violation of the Stark Law and submitted claims to Medicare knowing that the claims for those referred services were not eligible for payment. 

“Improper financial relationships between hospitals and physicians corrupt clinical decision-making, threaten patient care, and ultimately drive up Medicare costs,” said Assistant Attorney General Jody Hunt of the Department of Justice’s Civil Division.  “We are committed to eliminating these improper inducements and thereby ensuring the Medicare program remains fiscally sound to serve our nation’s senior citizens.”

“Our goal at the U.S. Attorney’s Office is to serve the citizens and help ensure safety in their communities,” said U.S. Attorney Josh Minkler for the Southern District of Indiana.  “Hospitals are responsible for not only the health and well-being of their patients, but are also required to establish a compliance program in order to protect against improper payments, fraud and abuse as a condition of enrollment in the Medicare program.” 

The United States filed its complaint in a lawsuit originally filed under the qui tam or whistleblower provisions of the False Claims Act, which allow private parties to file suit on behalf of the United States for false claims and to receive a share of any recovery.  The Act permits the United States to intervene and take over the lawsuit, as it has done here in part.  Those who violate the Act are subject to treble damages and applicable penalties.

The government’s resolution of this

matter illustrates the government’s emphasis on combating health care fraud.  One of the most powerful tools in this effort is the False Claims Act.  Tips and complaints from all sources about potential fraud, waste, abuse, and mismanagement, can be reported to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), at 800-HHS-TIPS (800-447-8477).

This case is being handled by the Justice Department’s Civil Division and the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Indiana, with assistance from the Office of Inspector General of the Department of Health and Human Services.  The case is captioned United States and the State of Indiana ex rel. Thomas Fischer v. Community Health Network, Inc., et al. No. 1:14-cv-1215 (RLY-DKL) (S.D. Ind.).

The claims in which the United States has intervened are allegations only, and there has been no determination of liability. 

The year 2020 marks the 150th anniversary of the Department of Justice.  Learn more about the history of our agency at www.Justice.gov/Celebrating150Years. 

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DOJ: Assistant Attorney General Brian A. Benczkowski Delivers Remarks at the 20th Annual Pharmaceutical and Medical Device Compliance Congress

Remarks as Prepared for Delivery

Good afternoon, and thank you for inviting me to speak at the 20th anniversary of this important forum, which brings together compliance experts across the pharmaceutical and medical device industries.  It is truly a pleasure to be here on behalf of the Criminal Division of the Department of Justice.  

At the outset, I would like to commend you for the important work that you do.  The Department greatly values the role of the corporate compliance community.  Every day, you work hard to reinforce legal and regulatory compliance and ethical behavior in business organizations, work that benefits all of us. 

The role of the federal prosecutor is, of course, different from that of a corporate compliance professional, but in many ways our goals are aligned.  We both want to deter corporate criminal misconduct, and we both want to detect such misconduct when it does occur, holding wrongdoers to account in our respective ways. 

With apologies for repeating a cliché -- the corporate compliance function is in some ways more important than the prosecution function. 

It can actually prevent misconduct in the first place through robust systems of controls, and by fostering a culture where compliance is valued and rewarded.  And while this aspect of corporate compliance is always important, it is especially important in the industries in which you operate, where the health and safety of patients often are at stake.

I came to my current role as the head of the Criminal Division from private practice, where I worked on investigations and compliance reviews for numerous life sciences clients. 

I know first-hand – both from that experience and my time with the Department – that the good corporate citizens within the pharmaceutical and medical device industries invest heavily in their compliance programs.  And they need to do so.  Most of you operate in a heavily regulated space, and the risks of non-compliance are high.

For at least the last two decades, the Department has made it clear that it expects companies to invest in effective compliance programs.  But I don’t think the Department has always been as clear about what that means – both in terms of what the Department would look for in an effective program, and with regard to how the Department’s prosecutors would factor compliance into resolving their corporate cases.

Over the last few years, including before I arrived, the Criminal Division has worked to be more transparent about how it approaches its evaluation of compliance programs, including developing new policies and guidance designed to help encourage responsible companies to fully invest in compliance, but also to invest wisely and efficiently.

Building on past efforts, in April of this year, the Criminal Division issued a newly expanded and refined guidance document for our white-collar prosecutors clarifying how to evaluate corporate compliance programs. 

This guidance promotes greater transparency in the specific factors we will use to evaluate the design and effectiveness of a compliance program.  It spells out numerous factors that the Criminal Division has frequently found relevant, but organizes them around three fundamental questions, which are always at the heart of our inquiry: 

1) Is the compliance program well designed?

2) Is the program being implemented effectively and in good faith?

3) And does the compliance program work in practice?

In setting forth these various factors, we were not seeking to be prescriptive.  We are not regulators, and we recognize that every company and industry is different. There is no such thing as a one-size-fits-all compliance program, nor should there be.  

We also know that no compliance program is 100% effective.  No system of controls is absolutely bulletproof.  

Corporations employ people, and not all of those people are going to be uniformly law-abiding and ethical.  Bad actors in a company will work to identify and exploit weak controls and compliance structures. 

The Criminal Division’s policies need to reflect that reality, especially because our prosecutors will invariably find themselves assessing a compliance program’s adequacy in hindsight, after a problematic event has already occurred. 

The policies and tools they bring to their analysis need to account for the fact that misconduct is sometimes going to happen, even within good organizations.  Our prosecution efforts need to differentiate between companies that are investing adequately in compliance and working hard to build a strong culture, and those that are not. 

Our written compliance guidance is crafted to avoid being overly rigid, allowing for each company’s program to be evaluated based on its unique risk profile. 

But the Division’s written guidance document is only part of what we’ve done to improve our prosecutors’ understanding of corporate compliance programs. 

In concert with our development of written compliance program guidance, we also trained all Criminal Division attorneys who work on corporate investigations to give them a range of perspectives on compliance program effectiveness. 

As part of that training, we brought in experts from inside the Department of Justice, as well as outside voices from industry and the accounting profession to share their views on various compliance challenges and how industry is confronting them. 

We looked at compliance challenges in high-risk markets and industries, as well as challenges that come with M&A due diligence and post-acquisition integration. We also focused on an area of growing attention in your industries, namely the evolution of compliance technology and data tools. 

All of this is part and parcel of a common effort in the Criminal Division to promote effective compliance regimes.  By training our prosecutors, we are making them better able to objectively assess the role of compliance in any corporate resolution, including whether to impose a monitor.  And by providing written guidance, our prosecutors should be working from a common understanding of how to do those assessments. 

But we also want you all to have a window into our thinking, so you can make wise, informed, and cost-effective decisions about whether and how to develop, grow, and enhance your compliance programs. 

This transparency hopefully will foster better alignment of the common goals I mentioned at the outset – deterrence of corporate crime on the front end, holding bad actors accountable on the back end, and doing so in a way that is fair and objective.     

We’ve made other policy changes as well that align with these goals.  Deterrence, of course, also is the objective behind applying the FCPA Corporate Enforcement Policy in all of our corporate criminal cases, including health care fraud cases.  Under this policy, a company receives the presumption of a declination if it voluntarily self-discloses the misconduct, fully cooperates with the Department, and engages in timely and appropriate remediation.   

Even if aggravating circumstances call for a criminal resolution, companies can get up to a 50% reduction off the bottom of the applicable fine range if the conditions of voluntarily self-disclosure, full cooperation, and timely and appropriately remediation are met. 

In a nutshell, the policy makes clear that when a company is serious about maintaining a culture of compliance, it can enjoy the peace of mind that the government will recognize that fact, and treat it fairly. 

Deterrence is also the objective behind the so-called “anti-piling on” policy.  That policy encourages enforcement components inside and outside of the Department of Justice to coordinate with one another when imposing penalties for the same conduct. 

Coordination includes crediting and allocating financial penalties and forfeitures to avoid disproportionate punishment.   

The “anti-piling on” policy is designed to encourage companies to aggressively root out perpetrators without fearing that they later will be subject to multiple penalties from multiple regulators. 

Deterrence is likewise the common thread behind our decision to be more transparent about corporate declinations under the enforcement policy. 

We now routinely publish corporate declinations on our website so that defense attorneys and corporate counsel can refer to these declination memoranda to understand the analysis behind our decision to not bring criminal charges.      

 All of these efforts have been geared toward enhancing transparency and fostering ethical corporate practices and behaviors so that companies will have the tools and information needed to invest fully in compliance, and so that criminal wrongdoing is deterred before it ever calls for the attention of the Department of Justice.

Enforcement

A few words about enforcement.  White-collar criminal enforcement and health care fraud continue to be a top priority for the Department of Justice and the Criminal Division.  

In 2018, our Fraud Section posted record numbers of white-collar prosecutions in a number of categories. 

In one year alone, we brought 10 corporate enforcement actions and recovered more than $1 billion in corporate U.S. criminal fines, penalties, restitution, and forfeiture, as part of resolutions that returned $3 billion globally. 

We also held individuals accountable for their criminal acts.  In 2018, the numbers of individuals charged increased by 33% from the prior year, and we convicted 40% more individuals at trial.

And as we near the end of 2019, we are on track to surpass many of those 2018 benchmarks.

In addition to general corporate enforcement, we have been laser-focused when it comes to combatting health care fraud and opioid fraud and abuse schemes that have destroyed so many lives across the United States. 

Health care fraud is a betrayal of the public trust -- it robs American taxpayers of billions of dollars every year and threatens our most vital federal programs, all while driving up the cost of health care and insurance. 

Illegal opioid schemes exploit the disease of addiction and corrupt the time-honored relationship between doctors and patients. 

During my tenure, we have brought the full power of the law to bear on the perpetrators of all these schemes.  

Over the last several months, we have announced indictments charging a variety of health care fraud, Anti-Kickback Statute, money laundering, and Controlled Substances Act violations in a number of regions of the country from Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia, and Ohio to Texas, California, New Jersey, and elsewhere. 

These indictments resulted from the successful work of our Strike Force model that combines seasoned prosecutors from the Criminal Division and U.S. Attorneys’ Offices, analysts, and law enforcement agents in federal districts across the country.

The Strike Force model has proven to be highly successful in combatting health care fraud and opioid abuse by combining data analytics and the use of traditional law enforcement investigative techniques.

It has allowed us to shine a bright light on dirty doctors, clinic owners, pharmacists, and others who long believed they could perpetrate their frauds and exploit their patients for personal financial gain without visibility. 

The data in our possession allows us to see them, however remote or rural their corner of the country.  With the overlay of traditional investigative techniques, we are able to use data analytics to track down the worst of the worst offenders and quickly build strong cases against them. 

In the past year, we expanded our Strike Force program to the Appalachian region to target opioid abuse related crimes and in the Rio Grande Valley and San Antonio, Texas.  We now have 15 total Strike Forces operating in 24 districts.

In just 2019 alone, the Criminal Division’s Health Care Fraud Strike Forces have brought charges against 354 individuals with a loss amount of over $4.1 billion. 

I’d like to highlight for you some of the schemes that we have uncovered and prosecuted which exploit new medical technology, like telemedicine, and use sophisticated money laundering to facilitate and disguise fraud. 

In April of this year, we announced the takedown of one of the largest health care fraud schemes ever investigated by the FBI and HHS-OIG, and prosecuted by the Criminal Division and U.S. Attorney’s Offices. 

The takedown resulted in charges against 24 defendants, including the CEOs, COOs, and others, associated with five telemedicine companies, the owners of dozens of durable medical equipment (DME) companies, and three licensed medical professionals, for their alleged participation in health care fraud schemes involving more than $1.2 billion in loss. 

Significantly, as part of this operation, our partners at the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ Center for Program Integrity took simultaneous adverse administrative action against 130 DME companies that had submitted over $1.7 billion in claims and were paid over $900 million.   These actions resulted in the immediate suspension of payments from the program and/or termination of the companies’ rights to bill the program at all.

As alleged in the indictments, DME companies paid illegal kickbacks and bribes in exchange for the referral of Medicare beneficiaries by medical professionals working with fraudulent telemedicine companies for back, shoulder, wrist, and knee braces that were medically unnecessary.  

Additionally, an international telemarketing network lured hundreds of thousands of elderly and/or disabled patients into a criminal scheme that crossed borders, involving call centers in the Philippines and throughout Latin America. 

These defendants allegedly paid doctors to prescribe DME either without any patient interaction or with only a brief telephonic conversation with patients they had never met or seen. 

The proceeds of the fraudulent scheme were then allegedly laundered through international shell corporations and used to purchase exotic automobiles, yachts, and luxury real estate in the United States and abroad.

The Criminal Division coordinates closely with its law enforcement and agency partners to ensure that we are proactively identifying and addressing the most serious threats to the Medicare program.  And this forward-leaning approach has led us to tackle health care fraud in new frontiers of medicine. 

Within just months of announcing the DME indictments, the Criminal Division unveiled another significant enforcement action involving fraudulent genetic cancer testing, in partnership with the U.S. Attorney’s Offices for the Southern and Middle Districts of Florida, the Southern District of Georgia, and the Eastern and Middle Districts of Louisiana

As part of that operation, we charged 35 defendants associated with dozens of telemedicine companies and genetic testing laboratories for their alleged participation in one of the largest health care fraud schemes ever charged – a scheme involving more than $2.1 billion in fraudulent Medicare billings.

This investigation targeted an alleged scheme involving the payment of illegal kickbacks and bribes by genetic testing laboratories in exchange for referrals of Medicare beneficiaries.  The referrals were made by medical professionals working with fraudulent telemedicine companies.  And the referrals were for expensive cancer genetic tests that were medically unnecessary. 

Indeed, often times the diagnostic results were never even provided to the beneficiaries or were worthless to their actual doctors. 

In addition to our efforts to combat health care fraud and opioid fraud and abuse on the home front, I want to highlight a recent corporate resolution that demonstrates our efforts to hold providers accountable for paying bribes to foreign government officials to gain a competitive advantage in the medical services industry. 

In March, I announced that the Fraud Section had entered into a corporate resolution with Fresenius Medical Care, one of the leading providers of dialysis products and services in the world.

The company had agreed to pay $231 million to resolve investigations by the DOJ and the SEC into violations of the FCPA in connection with Fresenius’ participation in various corrupt schemes to obtain business in multiple foreign countries. 

Fresenius admitted that between 2007 and 2016, it paid bribes to publicly employed health and/or government officials to obtain or retain business in Angola and Saudi Arabia, as well as in Morocco, Spain, Turkey, and countries in West Africa.  Fresenius also admitted that it knowingly and willfully failed to implement reasonable accounting controls over financial transactions and failed to maintain books and records that accurately and fairly described the transactions.

This resolution, under which Fresenius agreed to retain an independent compliance monitor for two years, reflects the Department’s firm commitment to rooting out bribery and promoting the kind of effective compliance programs that will prevent misconduct going forward.

****

It’s been a pleasure to speak here today.  As I hope you can tell, the Criminal Division will continue to aggressively investigate and prosecute health care and other frauds in the drug and device sectors.  I also hope my remarks give your industries some comfort that when we do investigate and prosecute, we will do so fairly, pursuant to clearly identified policies. There should be no mystery about how and why we bring and resolve enforcement actions.  And hopefully this transparency will help you prevent corporate crime, and help you make wise decisions about how to best deploy your compliance resources.  

Thank you very much, and I wish you the best for the remainder of the conference.

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DOJ Busts Missouri Child Welfare Fraud Scheme Funding Arkansas Political Campaigns & Other Forms of Stealin'

What?

A child welfare fraud scheme funding political campaigns for personal inurement???

They were stealin'.

I would do my "I told you so" dance, but I shall be humble...for now and drop the tutorial video for this matter, below.

Former Charity Executive Pleads Guilty to Bribery and Embezzlement Scheme

A former executive of a Springfield, Missouri charity, who was also an Arkansas lobbyist, pleaded guilty in federal court today to bribing Arkansas elected officials in a multi-million-dollar scheme, and then along with other charity executives, embezzling millions of dollars from the Springfield health care organization.

Acting Assistant Attorney General John P. Cronan of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division and U.S. Attorney Timothy A. Garrison for the Western District of Missouri made the announcement.

Milton Russell Cranford, aka “Rusty,” 57, of Rogers, Arkansas, pleaded guilty before U.S. Magistrate Judge David P. Rush to one count of federal program bribery.  Cranford was an executive at Preferred Family Healthcare Inc. (formerly known as Alternative Opportunities Inc.), a nonprofit corporation headquartered in Springfield, and oversaw the charity’s operations and lobbying efforts in the state of Arkansas. Cranford also operated three lobbying firms: The Cranford Coalition, The Capital Hill Coalition and Outcomes of Arkansas.

By pleading guilty today, Cranford admitted that he and other Preferred Family Healthcare executives paid bribes to Arkansas State Senator Jonathan Woods, Arkansas State legislator Henry Wilkins IV, a person identified in court documents as “Arkansas Senator A,” and others, to provide favorable legislative action for Cranford, his clients, and Preferred Family Healthcare. In exchange for the bribes paid by Cranford, the officials identified in the Information steered Arkansas General Improvement Fund (GIF) money to Preferred Family Healthcare and other Cranford clients; held up agency budgets; requested legislative audits; and sponsored, filed and voted for legislative bills that favored the charity and Cranford clients.

The additional income gained by Preferred Family Healthcare from Cranford’s bribes enabled Cranford and other executives of the charity to engage in multiple schemes to embezzle, steal, and unjustly enrich themselves at the expense of the charity, including, but not limited to, diverting charity funds to for-profit companies owned by the executives, causing the charity to make rental payments to properties owned by Cranford and the executives; paying for their personal expenses using corporate credit cards; and causing the charity to lend significant funds to Cranford personally, and to for-profit companies owned by other charity executives.  The executives also caused the charity to misapply its funds for unlawful contributions to the campaigns of elected public officials and causing the charity to spend substantial amounts of funds on lobbying and political advocacy.

In addition, Cranford entered into an illegal kickback scheme whereby Cranford paid over $600,000 in illegal kickbacks to a charity executive in exchange for more than $3.5 million in payments made to The Cranford Coalition.  Cranford also acknowledged his role in a second illegal kickback scheme involving the charity’s contract with Philadelphia, Pennsylvania-based political operative Donald Andrew Jones, also known as “D.A.” Jones, and another charity employee, former Arkansas State Representative Eddie Wayne Cooper.  In exchange for Cranford’s role in facilitating the charity’s contract with Jones for lobbying and political advocacy, under which the charity paid Jones almost $1 million, Cranford received kickbacks totaling $219,000 from Jones, $18,000 of which Cranford provided to Cooper, and Cooper received another $45,000 directly from Jones.  In separate but related cases, both Jones and Cooper previously entered guilty pleas acknowledging their roles in that kickback scheme.

A sentencing hearing will be scheduled after the completion of a presentence investigation by the U.S. Probation Office.

The case was investigated by IRS-Criminal Investigation, the FBI and the Offices of the Inspectors General from the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, Veterans Affairs, and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. This is a combined investigation with the Western District of Arkansas, the Eastern District of Arkansas, and the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.  This case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Steven M. Mohlhenrich of the Western District of Missouri and Trial Attorneys Marco A. Palmieri and Sean F. Mulryne of the Criminal Division’s Public Integrity Section.

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Whistleblowers Need To Writ Kiddy Kickbacks As False Claims

Whistleblower attorney in the act
of filing a sealed writ of
Medicaid fraud in child welfare

Remember the "Kids for Cash" scandal where the judge was busted getting kiddy kickbacks for sending kids to jail, for no reason?

Well, here is another one.

To be honest, I believe the Judge should dismiss the case, without prejudice, as it was not properly filed.

Why?  Because this should have been filed, under seal, as a False Claims case as it deals with Medicaid funding.

Since we all know the States Attorney General are constrained from going after Medicaid fraud in child welfare, the only other venue to pursue legal recourse would be federal.

To the attorneys on the case, go forth and proceed with the writ!

(My apologies for not pulling the complaint.  I have been a bit busy, lately.)

Judge to decide whether whistleblower suit should be dismissed

A judge in Washington County said he will consider whether the county’s former president judge and two other court officers should face trial in a whistleblower lawsuit brought by a former court employee.

Visiting Senior Judge William Nalitz from Greene County heard arguments Thursday from lawyers representing former Common Pleas Judge Debbie O’Dell Seneca and two other defendants who were sued by former juvenile probation officer David Scrip.

Mr. Scrip, 54, of Carroll, alleges he was unlawfully fired by Judge O’Dell Seneca after reporting a relationship between his former supervisor and a woman who worked as a placement officer for a treatment center for juvenile offenders.

Mr. Scrip claims he and other probation officers were pressured by Daniel Clements, his superior and the former chief probation officer of Washington County, to recommend placement for juveniles at Abraxas Youth and Family Services, where Mr. Clements’ girlfriend worked.

After he reported his concerns, Mr. Scrip said he was retaliated against and eventually fired by Judge O’Dell Seneca and Thomas Jess, the former director of the county’s probation services department.

“He worked in the juvenile probation department for 25 years and was never disciplined until the last 18 months, when he was written up three times then fired,” said Noah Geary, Mr. Scrip’s lawyer.

Along with former Judge O’Dell Seneca, Mr. Scrip sued Mr. Jess and Mr. Clements, neither of whom remain employed by the county. Judge O’Dell Seneca retired in January 2015, shortly after being stripped of her administrative duties when other judges complained to the Administrative Office of Pennsylvania Courts, which oversees the judiciary.

Mr. Scrip initially filed a lawsuit in federal court, but it was dismissed last year, prompting Mr. Geary to seek relief from the state court.

Judge O’Dell Seneca’s lawyer, Caroline Liebenguth and Robert Grimm, the lawyer representing the county, Mr. Jess and Mr. Clements, argued that their clients were immune from lawsuits as members of the state judiciary and under provisions in the state constitution.

“His client has no cause of action,” Mr. Grimm told the court. “The case should be dismissed.”

But Mr. Geary argued the suit shouldn’t be dismissed because the defendants were sued in their private capacity.

He also cited the code of conduct for judicial officers, revamped in 2011 after the “Kids for Cash” scandal in Luzerne County, in which two judges were accused of being paid to send juvenile offenders to certain facilities. According to the new code, court employees have “a duty to report wrongdoing without fear of reprisal,” Mr. Geary said.

Judge Nalitz is expected to rule within a month.

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Child Welfare Immunity With Starks's Law

Fortunately, no one in child welfare services can ever violate the physician self-referral law.

Here are a few examples: 

Administrator of a foster care agency will refer a foster child to his own individual therapy counseling services.

A judge presiding over an abuse and neglect case will refer the original guardians (parents) to her sister's foster care agency for unnecessary services.

Kiddy Kickbacks Is A Safe Harbor Of Stark's Law

Kiddy Kickbacks: n. The "safe harbor" provision of the federal anti-kickback statute which allows a contractor of a child welfare program to get away scott free when engaging in a Medicaid fraud scheme.

Economic Domestic Violence Against Children

If it is the last thing I do, I will make our lawmakers bow down and say "Medicaid fraud in child welfare" in public, loudly.

Poor people cannot lobby but we do have an internet presence and we do vote.

My response to the reintroduction of Violence Against Women's Act Op-Ed by U.W. Representative John Conyers, Jr.

Of course it is optimal for the posterity of the nation to target, as an immediate point of origin, the population of children, to prevent domestic violence, but this may only be done by recognizing a far more pervasive form of domestic violence entrenched within our society, and that is economic domestic violence.

Economic domestic violence is the ugly monster conceived under the darkness of regulation which survives without its natural predator of penalty, to launch multiple attacks upon the nation's health care system for children: Medicaid, CHIP and TRICARE.

Each incident of economic domestic violence against children must be considered as the individual filing of false claims, kiddy kickbacks, kiddy dumping, phantom services and double-billing under child welfare programs. Collectively, the pattern of practice of fraud, waste and abuse in child welfare services (i.e. foster care and adoption) have resulted in nothing less than a reign of economic terror upon our national treasures, the children.

Each year, hundreds of billions of dollars are violently taken from children under the guise of their best interest and no one will speak upon this. As a nation we have publicly acknowledged Medicare fraud with the intense partnership between the put children at risk as simply witnessed in income inequalities and its dramatic rise in poverty.

Until issues of fraud, waste and abuse in child welfare are included in the discussion, any legislation which does not provide for the amelioration of economic domestic violence against the children and their caretakers, is reduced to a political folly.

Dope Smok’n Largo Psych in Trouble with the Department of Health

Dope Smok’n Largo Psych in Trouble with the Department of Health

Sep 20th, 2011 | By admin | Category: Drug Use, Joel Voss

Largo Psychiatrist
Ronald Lee Knaus

Psych News
By Joel Voss

Largo, Florida psychiatrist Ronald Knaus was arrested on July 2, 2010 in nearby Clearwater for possession of marijuana. The police initially approached him due to a handgun in his waistband, per the police report. He pleaded no-contest in open court and was sentenced.

But the story does not end there. In Florida, all licensed health care professionals must report any and all criminal cases against them to the Florida Department of Health within 30 days unless they are acquitted or the charges are dismissed. Also, all physicians must update their profile on the department’s website to reflect any criminals convictions.

The Citizens Commission on Human Rights, Tampa, Florida Chapter found out about Knaus’s case and reported it to the department.

Earlier this month the Florida Department of Health filed their own administrative complaint against him, charging Knaus with withholding his drug case and not updating his online profile on their website. They are seeking discipline ranging from fines to revocation of his license.

In March 2008 a mother attacked her 15 year old son with a dagger and drywall knife at Kanus’ clinic at 1301 Seminole Blvd, Bldg B, Suite 112 in Largo.
The boy survived but was hospitalized. Knaus’ clinic was hired to provide a safe & supervised visitation of the mother and son. The boy’s father filed a lawsuit that is ongoing at this time.

Knaus was reported to be one of the Kings of the Baker Act, the Florida law governing involuntary commitment. It was reported in 1995 by the St Petersburg Times that Knaus was one of 3 psychiatrists in Pinellas County, Florida that accounted for half of the all involuntary commitments to mental hospitals in the county. Knaus committed people to a hospital that he was an investor in, the report stated.

A CPS Anit-Kickback Scheme

There are similar schemes in child welfare which I prefer to call "kiddy kickbacks". The schemes may not deal with durable medical goods, but they do deal with child welfare services.

A good example of a child welfare anti-kickback scheme would be the Godboldo case.

A mother takes her child in to the Children's Center for services then the Children's Center refers the child for foster care services on the next floor. This is a self-referral. Once the child is in the foster care case management division, billing for Targeted Case Management Services goes through the roof.

In the area of child protective services (CPS), the structures operate on the county and municipal levels. What this means is that a county CPS agency will refer a child to its own county Child Placing Agency (CPA).

Even though we are not dealing with physician referrals under Stark's law, this is an indirect violation of the anti-kickback statute.

This child welfare scheme is a kiddy kickback and since there are no laws preventing it, Medicaid fraud will flourish.

If it happens in Medicare, trust and believe, it happens in Medicaid.

Recruiter in Multi-Million Dollar Health Care Fraud Scheme Pleads Guilty to Conspiracy to Violate the Anti-Kickback Statute

HOUSTON – An accused recruiter in a multi-million dollar health care fraud scheme scheduled for trial on Monday, has instead pleaded guilty to conspiracy to violate the Anti-Kickback Statute, United States Attorney José Angel Moreno announced today. Birdie Leroy Revis, 60, of Houston, pleaded guilty before United States District Judge David Hittner this morning to conspiracy to violate the Anti-Kickback Statute. Trial had been scheduled to begin with jury selection on Monday, Aug. 8, 2011.

Revis was a recruiter for Sefan Medical Supply (Sefan), a durable medical equipment provider, located in Houston. Based upon the joint investigative efforts of the agencies comprising the Medicare Fraud Strike Force into a $2.8 million scheme to defraud Medicare by Sefan, evidence was obtained proving that Revis’ role in the scheme was to provide Medicare beneficiary information to Sefan. Sefan, in turn, then billed Medicare for medically unnecessary durable medical equipment and supplies which were either not provided to Medicare beneficiaries or a lesser product from what was billed to Medicare was provided. The information was provided on a prescription form for arthritis kits. All the kits included a knee adjustment with air chamber, rigid frame back brace, elbow with joint, ankle gauntlet, flex glove with elastic finger, heat lamp with stand and a wrist brace. Sefan would order these items for both the left and right side. If the beneficiaries received any items, they did not receive the rigid brace items billed to Medicare, instead they would receive neoprene sleeves, which was not covered by Medicare.

Revis provided to Sefan information for more than 686 beneficiaries for which Sefan paid Revis approximately $400 per beneficiary for a total of more than $353,000. With the information provided by Revis, Sefan billed Medicare for more than $2.8 million worth of claims for arthritis kits and was paid more than $1.7 million for those fraudulent claims.

Revis remains on bond pending sentencing, which is set on Nov. 2, 2011. Revis faces a maximum of up to five years in prison to be followed by up to a three-year-term of supervised release and a fine of up to $250,000 for the kickback conspiracy conviction.

The owner of Sefan and the physician whose signature was on the prescriptions have also been convicted following their respective pleas of guilty to conspiracy to commit health care fraud. Kate Ose Olear, the owner of Sefan, was sentenced to 57 months in prison on Feb. 10, 2011, by United States District Judge David Hittner. John Edward Perry III, the physician, pleaded guilty in June 2010. He remains on bond pending his sentencing on Oct. 21, 2011, before United States District Judge Gray H. Miller.

The investigation leading to the charges in this case was conducted by the Medicare Fraud Strike Force comprised of agents with the Department of Health and Human Services, Drug Enforcement Administration Diversion Division, Texas Attorney General Medicaid Fraud Control Unit, United States Railroad Retirement Board and the FBI. Assistant United States Jennifer Lowery and Special Assistant United States Attorney Justin Blan are prosecuting the case.

Southfield doctor to plead guilty in fraud cas

Southfield doctor to plead guilty in fraud case

Detroit— Gwendolyn Washington, a Southfield doctor convicted in a Detroit Public Schools corruption case, is expected to plead guilty this morning in a separate case alleging health care fraud and prescription drug dealing.

While the exact nature of the plea is unclear, federal prosecutors today filed a felony information charging her with health care fraud and soliciting/receiving payment in violation of the Health Care Anti-Kickback statute. Washington is scheduled to appear at noon in U.S. District Court.

She was charged in March with submitting claims to Medicare for procedures received by patients who were dead. She also was accused of writing phony prescriptions for powerful pain medications, which were sold illegally on the black market.

Washington, a Detroit resident who has a medical practice in Southfield, is awaiting sentencing Aug. 9 in the corruption case after pleading guilty to a conspiracy to commit fraud charge in March in U.S. District Court.

From January 2000 to November 2008, Medicare paid Washington and a company called Universal Imaging about $3.5 million for tests performed on her patients, according to prosecutors.

Washington ordered nuclear stress tests for patients every six months, which exposed them to increased risk of developing cancer, according to prosecutors.

In all, Washington submitted bills to Medicare for 10 patients who were dead at the time the services were performed, according to court records. That included 13 office visits, four home visits and eight claims for time spent supervising home care for those patients.

Investigators learned the patients were dead by checking the Social Security Death Index. In each case, the patients died before Washington said they received the services, according to the complaint.

In the DPS case, Washington pleaded guilty to charges stemming from a federal case in which she and others are accused of raiding more than $3 million from the cash-strapped Detroit school district.

Her sister, Detroit art gallery owner Sherry Washington, was convicted in the Detroit schools case last month and faces up to 20 years in prison.

DOJ Busts Detroit Public Schools Kiddy Kickback Racket

Shout out to Barbara McQuade:

Barbara McQuade

You go, girl!!!!!!

Detroit Businesswoman Convicted of Defrauding the Detroit Public Schools 

A federal jury in Detroit returned guilty verdicts yesterday against a Detroit businesswoman for conspiracy to defraud the Detroit Public Schools (DPS) of $3.3 million and money laundering conspiracy, announced United States Attorney Barbara McQuade.

Ms. McQuade was joined in the announcement by Special Agent in Charge Andrew G. Arena, Federal Bureau of Investigation, and Special Agent in Charge Erick Martinez, Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation.

Found guilty was Sherry Washington, 54, a partner in an entity doing business as “Associates For Learning.” The jury deliberated for about one hour and 20 minutes before returning the guilty verdicts after a two-week jury trial conducted before United States District Judge Paul D. Borman.

“These defendants exploited the Detroit Public Schools system and essentially stole $3 million that could have been spent on school children,” McQuade said. “We hope that this prosecution will discourage others from taking money that is intended to benefit students.”

According to the superseding indictment, Associates for Learning contracted with Stephen Hill, the former Executive Director of the Risk Management Department at DPS, to facilitate a wellness program for DPS employees, despite the lack of any bidding process or a written contract, in violation of DPS policies. The original proposal was for $150,000 for a six month pilot program. However, in 2005 and 2006 Associates for Learning submitted three inflated, fraudulent invoices to DPS, each for approximately $1 million, which DPS paid by electronic wire transfers. As part of the conspiracy, Hill was paid five percent cash kickbacks by members of Associates For Learning. Washington was also convicted of money laundering in an attempt to conceal the kickbacks.

Seven others charged in this case have all pleaded guilty for their roles in the conspiracy to commit program fraud by submitting fraudulent invoices to DPS for services and thereafter participating in making kickbacks to Hill. Those include Gwendolyn Washington, Marilyn White, and Sally Jo Bond, who were business partners of Sherry Washington’s; Duane Polk, Valerie Polk, Thomas Ray Taylor, and Stephen Hill The original indictment, returned on April 18, 2010, had also named former DPS Risk Management executive Christina Polk-Osumah, who died of natural causes on September 2, 2010.

Sentencings for the defendants are set for July and August.

The case was investigated by special agents of the FBI and IRS with the cooperation of Detroit Public Schools, Office of Inspector General. The case is being investigated and prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney J. Michael Buckley of the Public Corruption Unit.

Conyers Stops Child Abuse

CPS Live Buzz Interviews Doctor About Psych Evaluations

ACFE Does Not Recognize Child Welfare Fraud As Fraud

Recently, I received this email from American Certified Fraud Examiners

Dear Ms. Tran:

Would you like to co-author a book on bribery and corruption with me?


As your founder and chairman, I’ve published 20 books and nearly two hundred articles on fraud. Many of them have won awards. The last four books have been compilations of actual cases worked by ACFE members. The first piece was called Fraud Casebook: Lessons from the Bad Side of Business; the second was Computer Fraud Casebook: The Bytes that Bite; the third was Internet Fraud Casebook: The World Wide Web of Deceit; and the most recent was Financial Statement Fraud: Baking the Ledgers and Cooking the Books. They have generated significant royalties for the ACFE Foundation, a non-profit that provides scholarships for our budding fraud examiners.


We are now conceiving a fifth book of case studies, this time on bribery and corruption. Whether it will be submitted to our publisher, John Wiley & Sons, will depend entirely on the submissions we receive from people like you. So if you are interested, please read on.


What is required is an actual, completed case of bribery, corruption or kickbacks where you personally assisted in the investigation. You will be required to write the case study in a minimum of 3,500 and a maximum of 5,000 words. Your manuscript must be written in a prescribed format that we will furnish to you later. To avoid liability issues, you may not use real names of people or companies in your narrative.


The purpose of this book is to educate our members and the public on how bribery and corruption schemes work, how they are investigated and how they are prevented. We estimate that the final book will consist of about fifty cases. All royalties will be donated to the ACFE Foundation, a non-profit that provides college scholarships to the next generation of fraud-fighters. So there is no money in it for you (or me, for that matter), but you will receive ten free copies and be listed as a co-author. This can be a tremendous boost to your budding career as a writer and can do wonders for your résumé.


In order for your case to be considered for publication, corruption must have been a significant part of the scheme. Examples include:

• Kickbacks to employees from vendors
• Government officials accepting bribes
• Bankers soliciting an under-the-table fee for granting a loan
• Other corruption schemes, such as conflicts of interest

If you would like to impart your experience and lessons learned with your fellow anti-fraud professionals and the public, please share your story with us.

To apply, please click here and fill out the questionnaire by April 29, 2011. After reviewing submissions, I alone will select the final cases. Each story should maintain an element of human interest and be comprehensible to a general audience. Publishing a book such as this is a long and detailed process, but our ACFE editors will help you along the way. We hope by the fourth quarter of this year that the manuscript can be completed and the book published in the first quarter of 2012, if not before. The project manager at the ACFE will be Ms. Laura Hymes, whose e-mail address is lhymes@ACFE.com. All questions should be directed to her.

Thank you for your attention.

Sincerely,

  

Dr. Joseph T. Wells, CFE, CPA
Founder and Chairman
Association of Certified Fraud Examiners

After laughing my ass off because a private organization has constructed a scheme to substantially profit off the work of its members without offering any financial compensation, I though I would have another good jolly by responding:

Interesting. Are you prepared to address child welfare fraud?

They actually responded.

Dear Ms. Tran,

Thank you for your response. Unfortunately at this time we are only considering cases that directly involve corruption.

All the best,

----------------

Laura Hymes

Research Editor

Association of Certified Fraud Examiners

World Headquarters - The Gregor Building

716 West Avenue - Austin, TX 78701

512-276-8120 (phone and fax)

www.acfe.com

I thought I would assist the responder preserve my name in her mind with this final retort:

The immediacy of your presumption demonstrates a woefully lack of sophistication in the subject matter of deontological ethics, more readily recognized as "corruption".


I have publicly shared your position on child welfare fraud.

That's right, the American Certified Fraud Examiners do not believe there is fraud and corruption in child welfare,

So, the moral of the story goes.... child abuse propaganda is not exclusive to contractual arms of the state!  Private organizations allow child welfare fraud to flourish, also.