Twenty folks, a psychological well being enterprise and a church had been charged in an indictment that alleged Arizona’s Medicaid program was defrauded $60 million in a scheme involving billing for psychological well being therapy and dependancy rehabilitation, the most recent indictment in a sequence of crackdowns within the state specializing in sober dwelling houses.
The indictment introduced Tuesday alleged Glad Home Behavioral Well being LLC was paid the cash for companies that had been both by no means supplied or solely partially accomplished and that there was billing for shoppers who had been deceased and incarcerated.
Authorities say sober dwelling houses referred shoppers to the behavioral well being enterprise, which obtained cash from the Arizona Well being Care Price Containment System after which paid the houses for the shoppers in violation of state regulation.
Cash laundering expenses alleged Glad Home Behavioral Well being paid $5 million in July 2023 to a Hope of Life Worldwide Church, which later wired $2 million to an entity in Rwanda.
The costs in opposition to Glad Home Behavioral Well being embody conspiracy, fraud, forgery, theft and cash laundering.
The Related Press left an e-mail with a lawyer representing Glad Home Behavioral Well being.
In an announcement, Hope of Life Worldwide Church mentioned it was unjustly charged with cash laundering for accepting a donation from a licensed sober dwelling facility that was a tenant of the church and was later accused of defrauding the state’s Medicaid program. The church mentioned it didn’t have entry to the sober dwelling facility’s inner operations, monetary practices or administration choices.
“The church’s solely relationship was that of a landlord and, later, as a recipient of a donation — a donation accepted in good religion, according to its mission and longstanding follow,” the assertion mentioned.
In all, greater than 100 folks and a number of other firms have been charged in circumstances introduced by Legal professional Basic Kris Mayes’ workplace within the state’s crackdown on Medicaid fraud and unlicensed sober dwelling houses, lots of which focused tribal group members. The state had suspended funds to greater than 100 suppliers as a part of the crackdown.
The rip-off had left an unknown variety of Native Individuals homeless on the streets of metro Phoenix as fraudulent sober dwelling houses misplaced their funding and turned former residents out onto the streets.
Navajos account for many Native Individuals grappling with addictions who’ve been affected by the rip-off. Navajo officers say that in some circumstances, individuals who ended up within the houses had been picked up in unmarked vans and pushed to the Phoenix space from faraway locations on the sprawling Navajo Nation that stretches throughout northern Arizona, and elements of New Mexico and Utah.
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