Submitted by New Jersey Criminal Lawyer, Jeffrey Hark.
A pain management doctor, who also specializes in anesthesia, with practices in Central and South Jersey has been charged by U.S. Attorney Craig Carpenito for his alleged role in a multi-million billing fraud scheme.
Dr. Morris Antebi, 68, of Long Branch has offices in Manahawkin, Sicklerville, Northfield, Vineland and Cape May Court House.
He is facing a couple decades in prison after being charged with three counts of health care fraud, wire fraud and mail fraud for his role in the scheme.
Antebi is accused of billing Medicare, Medicaid and several private insurance plans for more than $24.6-million combined for services he didn’t actually provide to patients.
Attorney Carpenito said that Antebi also frequently billed Medicare, Medicaid, and private insurance companies on dates when travel records show he was overseas which featured trips to China, Israel, Turkey, the Dominican Republic and across Europe, or when he was just outside the State.
Antebi billed insurance companies and plans between November 2015 and January 2020 for services “he purportedly rendered while he was traveling and not in the office.”
His scheme included excessive billings for one-day periods of time when he would bill for more than 24 hours worth of services in a one-day period of time on more than 900 occasions between 2014 and 2020.
Carpenti said there were also more than 300 occasions where Antebi billed insurance companies for between 12 and 23.99 hours but law enforcement eventually caught onto to his scheme and surveilled Antebi including on days when he left his clinics early, but still billed “as though he saw many patients on those days.”
Sometimes Antebi is accused of only seeing them for only very brief periods of time and not performing any medical exams or evaluations during the visit.
Victims told investigators that there sometimes was “no medical equipment or examination tables in the rooms at the clinics in which patients met with providers, and that patients sometimes met with providers on folding chairs in the hallway of the clinics.”
Antebi faces a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison for health care fraud along with a $250,000 fine or twice the gross gain or loss from the offense.
The wire fraud and mail fraud counts each carry a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine, or twice the gross gain or loss from the offense.
The government is represented by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Christina O. Hud and Daniel A. Friedman of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Camden.
Originally published here by 1057thehawk.com