Eli's Rehab Report

Published on Tue May 24, 2011 PDF

Court doubles down -- owners must also pay $345K each in restitution.

You'd better provide the therapy services you bill for or the feds will catch up with you - and the fallout won't be pretty.

That's the lesson Aaron and Michelle Clark of Superior Physical Therapy in Sault Ste. Marie, Mich., have learned after a U.S. District Court sentenced the couple to jail time and steep fines for defrauding Medicare and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan (BCBSM), the Associated Press reports.

In a written plea agreement, Aaron Clark admitted to a felony charge of health care fraud and Michelle Clark admitted to a misdemeanor charge of theft from a health care benefit program after allegations that the couple used different schemes to obtain payment for services they either didn't provide or that didn't qualify as physical therapy.

Price tag: Aaron Clark will spend two years in prison followed by three years of supervised release. He must pay $345,000 in restitution. Michelle will spend 90 days in prison with one year of supervised release. She, too, must pay back $345,000, according to a press release by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

The fraud was uncovered by a joint investigation by the FBI, the Office of Inspector General for the Department of Health and Human Services, and BCBSM officials.