BATON ROUGE, LA—United States Attorney Donald J. Cazayoux, Jr. announced that BENJAMIN AMADI, age 55, of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, was sentenced this morning by U.S. District Court Judge James J. Brady to serve 30 months in federal prison as a result of a lengthy health care fraud scheme that he perpetrated in the Baton Rouge area.
AMADI was charged in an indictment that was filed on April 28, 2010, and AMADI pled guilty to health care fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1347, on March 3, 2011. The case arose from a fraud scheme involving a company known as Liberty Medical Services, LLC (“Liberty”), which provided power wheelchairs and other durable medical equipment to Medicare beneficiaries in the Baton Rouge area. AMADI owned, operated, and managed Liberty. Through Liberty, AMADI engaged in a scheme to defraud the Medicare program by submitting false and fraudulent claims to Medicare for equipment that had not been provided and was medically unnecessary. For instance, in January of 2008, AMADI submitted a claim to Medicare seeking $9,350, representing to Medicare that Liberty had provided a beneficiary with an extra heavy-duty power wheelchair, designed for beneficiaries weighing more than 600 pounds. In fact, Liberty had purchased and provided a much less expensive wheelchair. In connection with his guilty plea, AMADI admitted that his scheme continued for at least a year.
This morning, Judge Brady sentenced AMADI to serve a term of imprisonment of 30 months. AMADI was also ordered to pay $632,500.31 in restitution, a $7,500 fine, and a $100 special assessment. The court also ordered AMADI to forfeit an additional $632,500.31 in proceeds from his fraud scheme. Following his release from imprisonment, AMADI will be required to serve a two-year term of supervised release.
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