Owners of Texas home healthcare company indicted in Medicare fraud scheme
Co-owners and two employees charged with conspiracy and fraud in alleged scheme that bilked Medicare for more than $13 million.
The co-owners of a Dallas-based home health business as well as two nurse employees have been charged with conspiracy and fraud for allegedly submitting false claims to Medicare for $13.4 million dollars, according to the FBI.
Patience Okoroji, 57, and Usani Ewah, 58, co-owned the company, Timely Home Health Services Inc. Joy Ogwuegbu, a registered nurse, and Kingsley Nwanguma, a licensed vocational nurse, were employees. All are charged with one count of conspiracy to commit fraud as well as multiple counts of healthcare fraud, the FBI said in a Dec. 23 statement, after the indictment was unsealed.
The alleged scheme is said to have run from January 2007 to September 2015, during which time Okoroji and Ewah would sometimes pay recruiters to sign up Medicare beneficiaries for home health care services, whether the services were needed or not. The FBI said Nwanguma allegedly served as such a recruiter, and Okoroji, Ewah and Ogwuegbu "prepared or caused to be prepared fraudulent Medicare documents that made it appear the beneficiaries qualified for home health services."
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The documents were subsequently used by doctors to certify Medicare beneficiaries for home care. According to the FBI, Okoroji and Ewah submitted $13,434,550 in false claims to Medicare.
Accordingto the FBI, the case was brought as part of the Medicare Fraud Strike Force, which was started in 2007 and is supervised by the FBI Criminal Division's Fraud Section and the U.S. Attorney's office. The force operates in nine cities nationwide, and has charged roughly 2,300 defendants. The FBI said those defendants billed Medicare for more than $7 billion.
Twitter: @BethJSanborn
