O.C. District Attorney charges family, doctors with insurance fraud related to sober living homes...

[TexasTowelie]

O.C. District Attorney charges family, doctors with insurance fraud related to sober living homes, urine tests

SANTA ANA – The owners of a string of Southern California sober living homes and two medical doctors are facing insurance fraud charges tied to what authorities allege was a $22 million urine test billing scheme, the Orange County District Attorney’s Office announced Tuesday.

Six people were charged last week with a variety of felonies – including medical fraud, insurance fraud and money laundering – in connection to the suspected scheme involving recruited sober living residents and alleged front companies that are accused of persuading insurance carriers to pay for unneeded or non-existent urine tests.

The charges were revealed two days after publication of the Southern California News Group’s investigation into the region’s rehab industry, including the shady practices of some sober living homes and the excessive insurance charges some rack up for urine tests.

The investigation revealed, among other things, that fraudulent urine tests – often performed by labs owned by the owners of rehabs or sober living homes – were a main tool some in the industry used to bilk millions of dollars from insurance companies.

Read more: http://www.ocregister.com/2017/05/23/o-c-district-attorney-charges-family-doctors-with-insurance-fraud-related-to-sober-living-homes-urine-tests/