WASHINGTON – An owner of multiple Baton Rouge medical equipment companies pleaded guilty today for her role in a Medicare fraud scheme involving false claims and illegal kickback payments for unnecessary durable medical equipment (DME), announced the Department of Justice, the FBI, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Louisiana State Attorney General’s Office.
Chikenna D. Jones, 36, pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge James J. Brady of the Middle District of Louisiana to one count of conspiracy to commit health care fraud and one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States and to pay and receive health care kickbacks.
According to court documents, Jones owned and operated Healthcare 1 LLC, Medical 1 Patient Services LLC, Lifeline Healthcare Services Inc., and Rose Medical Inc., Louisiana-based companies that fraudulently billed DME to the Medicare program from 2004 to 2009. She and Henry Jones, who was her husband at the time, hired patient recruiters to obtain prescriptions for DME such as leg braces, arm braces, power wheel chairs and wheel chair accessories. Specifically, the patient recruiters obtained information from Medicare beneficiaries and used the information to acquire prescriptions for DME from the beneficiaries’ primary care physicians. Chikenna Jones paid the recruiters illegal kickbacks for the DME prescriptions, which she knew were not medically necessary.
Court documents allege that the companies owned and operated by Chikenna Jones billed Medicare for more than $21 million.
Jones faces a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison on the conspiracy to commit health care fraud count and five years in prison on the conspiracy to defraud the United States count. A sentencing date has not yet been set.
***********************************************************************
Report Medicare & Medicaid Fraud by Calling 1-888-482-6825 or by visiting
www.usawhistleblower.com
