Washington, DC – Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced that five defendants have pled guilty for their roles in a systematic scheme to defraud private insurance companies of more than $400 million under New York’s no-fault automobile insurance law.
The case is the largest single no-fault automobile insurance fraud scheme ever charged. Andrey Anikeyev, an owner and controller of various acupuncture clinics, pled guilty before U.S. District Judge J. Paul Oetken to conspiracy to commit mail fraud and health care fraud. Dmitry Slobodyansky, who owned and controlled chiropractic clinics, also pled guilty before Judge Oetken to conspiracy to commit mail fraud and health care fraud. Sergey Gabinsky, a medical doctor, pled guilty before Judge Oetken earlier in Febuary, and Pavel Poznansky, an acupuncturist, and Constantine Voytenko, a chiropractor, pled guilty before Judge Oetken in December 2012. All five were arrested in February 2012 with 31 other defendants, some of whom were also charged with racketeering and money laundering. The 36 defendants include 10 doctors and three attorneys.
Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said, “These five defendants piled up fraud to the tune of $400 million in a scheme to exploit New York’s no-fault auto insurance laws. We remain committed to ensuring that all their alleged co-conspirators, including the corrupt medical and legal professionals charged with using their professional licenses and training to facilitate this brazen fraud, see justice.”
According to the indictment, superseding informations, and other publicly filed information in the case:
Under New York State law, every vehicle registered in New York State is required to have no-fault automobile insurance, which enables the driver and passengers of a registered and insured vehicle to obtain benefits of up to $50,000 per person for injuries sustained in an automobile accident, regardless of fault (the “No-Fault Law”).
In order to mislead New York authorities and private insurers, some of the defendants in this case who were the true owners of these medical clinics (“No-Fault Clinic Controllers”) paid licensed medical practitioners, including doctors, to use the practitioners’ licenses to incorporate the professional corporations through which the medical clinics billed the private insurers for the bogus medical treatments. Gabinsky was one such doctor who admitted in open court to prescribing unnecessary medical treatments and to allowing co-conspirators to use his medical license to unlawfully open medical clinics in order to defraud insurance companies. Poznansky and Voytenko were medical practitioners who billed insurance companies for treatments to patients that were unnecessary.
The No-Fault Clinic Controllers also instructed the clinic doctors to prescribe excessive and unwarranted referrals for various “modality treatments” for nearly every patient they saw. The treatments included physical therapy, acupuncture, and chiropractic treatments—as much as five times per week for each—and treatments for psychology, neurology, orthopedics, and audiology. Clinic doctors also prescribed unnecessary MRIs, X-rays, orthopedics, and medical supplies. The No-Fault Clinic Controllers received thousands of dollars in kickbacks for patient referrals from the owners of the modality clinics (“modality controllers”). Anikeyev and Slobodyansky were two such Modality Controllers who admitted to billing insurance companies for treatments that patients did not need.
Source: Imperial Valley News