Maine home health managers indicted for suppressing wages during pandemic

Four Maine home health agency managers were indicted by a federal grand jury last week for suppressing wages of personal support specialists in the first few months of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The felony indictment filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maine said that the managers — Faysal Kalayaf Manahe, Yaser Aali, Ammar Alkinani and Quasim Saesah — conspired to suppress wages and limit job mobility of essential workers by agreeing to fix workers' rates and not hire workers from each other's companies in April 2020.

"(Personal support specialist) workers and other essential workers risked their health caring for others at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic," Assistant Attorney General Jonathan Kanter of the Justice Department's antitrust division said in a news release. "The indictment in this case alleges that the employers of these workers colluded to deprive them of opportunities to earn better wages."

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The indictment did not list the names of the companies operated by the managers, but state licensing records show that Ocean Home Health of Portland and Kennebec Home Health of Augusta were owned by Alkinani and Saesah, respectively. The managers of those facilities could not immediately be reached for comment.

The indictment alleges the managers agreed to pay workers $15 to $16 per hour and pressured other home health agency operators to do so as well, threatening to report the other managers to MaineCare, Maine's Medicaid program. In March 2020, the Maine Department of Health and Human Services increased the reimbursement rate for home health agencies from $20.52 per hour to $26.20 per hour to allow them to give workers raises, the indictment notes.

"Early in the pandemic, Maine made additional resources available to ensure that seniors continued to receive in-home care and that essential workers would be able to afford personal protective equipment," U.S. Attorney Darcie McElwee for the District of Maine said in a news release.

The charges against the four home health managers are part of a larger investigation into wage fixing in the home healthcare industry by the Justice Department.

The maximum penalty for conspiracy to restrain trade is 10 years in jail and a $1 million fine, which can be increased based on the financial gains and losses caused by the crime, the indictment said.