Nineteen people, including many home healthcare workers, have been indicted for allegedly billing the US government more than $4 million for thousands of hours they did not perform, federal authorities reported Tuesday. The suspects have been charged with healthcare fraud and other charges for allegedly conspiring to cheat Pennsylvania’s Medicare program.
In one case, two home health workers recorded billable hours for two patients while they were in the hospital, working another job, or in jail. All four people are facing criminal charges. They are not paperwork or good-faith accounting errors. They include alleged home health aides who billed the taxpayer for home care services but never provided them, as well as alleged Medicaid patients who conspired with other fraudsters to bill the taxpayer for completely unnecessary health services,” Assistant Attorney General Colin McDonald stated.
In another case, Ashley Griffin, a 27-year-old home health care worker, allegedly submitted over 64,000 fake work hours between 2020 and 2023, including a report that she worked 126 hours on one day. Griffin allegedly submitted over 1,000 time cards indicating she worked more than 24 hours in a single day. U.S. Attorney David Metcalf stated that home health care services were billed by aides who were deceased, in prison, peddling narcotics, or billing while jetsetting across the Caribbean and Europe.
Sean Murray, who has already been accused of cocaine sales, is now facing allegations of false healthcare billing. We contend that, in addition to trafficking cocaine, he defrauded Medicaid by providing bogus home care services that were not actually delivered. Instead, he was at the gym, a massage parlor, on a vacation, or, at worst, packaging narcotics to operate his drug-trafficking organization,” Metcalf stated.
Murray boasted about how simple the method was in one phone call from jail, calling it “the best kept secret,” according to Metcalf.
According to court filings, Murray, Griffin, and others arranged kickbacks with the people they were purported to care for, giving them a percentage of the funds in exchange for continuing the arrangement.
Another defendant’s Instagram story got him into trouble. While allegedly billing for home health care employment in the Philadelphia area, his social media page showed him drinking and relaxing by a resort pool in Miami, Florida.
Albert Coccia Jr., 56, and Santino Coccia, 28, were indicted for attempting to bill Medicaid for home health care labor that the son did while working as a rideshare and delivery driver.
Officials also announced the expansion of an anti-fraud prosecution “strike force” to Philadelphia.
Under normal conditions, home healthcare services enable friends and family to care for an ill or disabled loved one without placing them in a nursing facility or hospice.
Every year, Pennsylvania spends $8 billion on home healthcare, ranking fifth among states, according to McDonald.
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