An Illinois man and a foreign national have been yesterday on criminal charges related to their alleged submission of more than $227 million in fraudulent claims to Medicare.
According to court documents, Syed Murtuza Kablazada, 34, of Arlington Heights, and Syed Mehdi Hussain, 32, of Carol Stream, owned and operated purported medical laboratories that submitted fraudulent claims to Medicare for the reimbursement of over-the-counter COVID-19 test kits allegedly provided to Medicare beneficiaries.
The defendants allegedly installed foreign nationals to act as nominee owners at the laboratories to submit fraudulent claims to Medicare for the provision of over-the-counter COVID-19 test kits, with the understanding the nominee owners would flee the United States when they learned that their laboratory was under investigation.
“As alleged, the defendants used straw owners at multiple laboratories to cause the submission of more than $200 million in fraudulent claims to Medicare for COVID-19 test kits,” said Matthew R. Galeotti, Head of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division.
“The overwhelming fraud uncovered in this investigation details a blatant disregard for America’s critical health care program, Medicare, and puts all patients at risk,” said Special Agent in Charge Douglas S. DePodesta of the FBI Chicago Field Office.
As alleged in the indictment, the defendants rarely provided Covid-19 test kits to Medicare beneficiaries but instead submitted reimbursement claims on behalf of beneficiaries who had not requested COVID-19 test kits, including individuals who were deceased.
Further, the defendants allegedly paid a marketing company to provide the names of hundreds of thousands of Medicare beneficiaries that the defendants used to submit fraudulent claims.
In total, between September 2022 and June 2023, the defendants’ labs billed Medicare approximately $227 million in fraudulent claims, of which Medicare paid approximately $136 million in reimbursements.
Kablazada and Hussain are both charged by indictment with four counts of health care fraud. If convicted, they face a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison on each of the four counts.
