Five people were arrested by the California Department of Justice in connection with a major health care and hospice fraud scheme in Southern California that defrauded taxpayers of nearly a quarter of a billion dollars, Attorney General Rob Bonta announced on April 9. In total, the state filed charges against 21 people.
The investigation, Operation Skip Trace, which the state's DOJ initiated, uncovered and dismantled a Medi-Cal scheme in which 14 hospice companies purchased personal information of non-California residents on the dark web and enrolled the stolen identities in the state-administered Medicaid program.
The fraud was initially suspected by the California Department of Health Care Services, which informed the state's DOJ, and it was discovered that no hospice services had ever been rendered at any of the 14 sites. The total fraudulent billing is approximately $267 million.
“Fraud is a direct attack on Medi-Cal members who rely on us for care, and we will not stand for it,” said Michelle Baass, California Department of Health Care Services Director, in the press release. “Our safeguards worked as designed: we identified irregularities early, stopped further improper payments, and suspended the fraudulent providers.”
