A federal court has sentenced the co-founder of several fake physical therapy clinics to 14 months in prison and more than $250,000 in restitution after a Department of Labor probe found the operators collected money from 15 self-funded healthcare benefit programs for services they never provided.
The U.S. District Court for the Western District of Kentucky ordered Yesdel Acosta Perez, co-founder of Romero Rehabilitation Physical Therapy Inc. and Empire USA in Louisville, as well as Imaging Group Center Inc. in Atlanta, Ga., to 14 months in prison and pay $258,507 in restitution, according to a March 3 news release.
“Healthcare fraud creates great public mistrust, hurts participants who depend on their essential benefits and the employers who provide their coverage and increases healthcare costs for all of us,” Employee Benefits Security Administration Regional Director Joe Rivers said in the release.
Acosta Perez pleaded guilty in February to a felony count of conspiracy to commit healthcare fraud, the release reported. The prosecution of the co-founders of the three fake clinics followed an investigation by the department’s Employee Benefits Security Administration.
Acosta Perez, who fled the country before his indictment in June 2018, reportedly aided Eduardo Chinea-Martinez and others in billing various healthcare benefit programs through claims administrators Humana, CIGNA and United Healthcare for $4.7 million for services they never provided from May 2015 to January 2016, the release said.
Before his flight, Acosta Perez opened bank accounts for the fake businesses at JPMorgan Chase Bank, Wells Fargo Bank and Bank of America, according to the release. In March 2020, Chinea-Martinez was sentenced to 42 months in prison and three years of supervised release for his part in the scheme.
The Italian government granted the U.S.' extradition request, and surrendered Acosta Perez to authorities July 22, 2022, the release reported.
