Home Health & Hospice Week

Patient recruiters feature in fraud cases.

Texas has produced two more guilty verdicts related to home health fraud.

In a three-day trial, a Houston federal jury convicted Colony Home Health Services owner Alfred Olotin Alatan and Milten Medical Clinic owner Francis Ekene after only 45 minutes of deliberation, the Department of Justice notes in a release. Prosecutors showed that Alatan paid patient recruiters for referrals, then billed for medically unnecessary services for the patients. And a physician at Ekene’s clinic would sign plans of care for the patients when they weren’t actually under his care.

Alatan was also convicted of money laundering.

Two clinic operators who testified in the trial already pleaded guilty in the case. Susana Bermudez is serving a 30-month sentence and Rita Kpotie Smith awaits sentencing in July. Alatan and Ekene are also scheduled for sentencing in July.

Other recent cases include:

Also in Houston: Home health agency owner Okorie Oko and patient recruiter Henry C. Dobbins have been arrested on fraud and kickback charges. An indictment alleges that from 2015 to 2022, Oko billed Medicare for home health services that were never provided by Elitte Healthcare and Service Inc.; created false medical records; paid kickbacks to Dobbins, patients, and marketers; and billed for services furnished to marketing reps, the DOJ says in a release. Oko and Elitte fraudulently billed more than $10 million to Medicare, the indictment alleges.

In Delaware: It’s not just Medicare rules that HHA owners violate. Middletown home health agency owner Nyashia Coryaba failed to pay federal income taxes withheld from her employees during the third quarter of 2019, the DOJ says in a release. Coryaba owns Greater Works Companion Care, according to WDEL News. Coryaba also admitted to failing to pay over taxes between June 2015 and December 2019 and agreed to pay restitution to the Internal Revenue Service totaling $579,640. Coryaba used the tax funds for “personal expenditures,” the DOJ says.