A Michigan surgeon is among a group of healthcare professionals indicted by the U.S. Department of Justice in an alleged $11 million scheme to defraud Medicare.
Dr. Mustafa Hares, 76, who performed surgeries at several hospitals throughout Southeast Michigan, was indicted Thursday for completing fraudulent patient charts for kickbacks from a Farmington Hills substance abuse therapy facility, Centre HRW.
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Mohamed Kazkaz, 54, owns Centre HRW and bribed Ziad Khalel, a patient recruiter, to refer Medicare patients to his center even when medically unnecessary, according to the complaint. Often, the patients filled out Centre HRW sign-in sheets and Kazkaz billed Medicare even though no services were provided, the DOJ alleges.
Khalel, 52, and Kazkaz were indicted by the feds in January.
Centre HRW ultimately billed Medicare $11 million, and the agency paid out more than $5.3 million toward allegedly fraudulent claims.
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"Healthcare professionals who fraudulently bill Medicare for services never actually provided divert taxpayer money meant to pay for medically necessary services for people enrolled in Medicare," James Tarasca, special agent in charge of the FBI in Michigan, said in a press release. "The FBI is committed to working with our partners to eradicate schemes that defraud government-sponsored health care programs."
Joining Hares in the new round of indictments is Centre HRW's office manager, Gamela Ali. Ali, 33, was responsible for gathering information on patients' legitimate medical appointments to avoid submitting Medicare claims on the same date as a conflicting doctor's appointment, the feds allege. Geraldine Letman, a clinical social worker from Phoenix, was also allegedly fraudulently completing patient charts for Centre HRW.
The case is being prosecuted in U.S. District Court in Detroit by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Regina McCullough and Philip Ross.
This story first appeared in Crain's Detroit Business.
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