Alexandra Gehrke, 39, and her husband Jeffrey King, 46, both of Phoenix, agreed to pay $615 million and $605.7 million, respectively, in restitution, according to a Jan. 31 Justice Department news release. She instructed and financially incentivized these representatives to order grafts only in sizes of 4×6 centimeters or larger, even if the wound was much smaller, to maximize health insurance reimbursement.
Through the companies she owned, Ms. Gehrke received more than $279 million in kickbacks from the distributor of the grafts in exchange for the orders. She, in turn, paid the sales representatives tens of millions of dollars in kickbacks. She then referred patients to a company co-owned by her husband, which contracted with nurse practitioners to apply the grafts.
The moral of this story and the others that I have been blogging about is if it smells bad, and it seems bad or wrong, and your getting money illegally it is illegal!
https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/arizona-couple-pleads-guilty-12b-health-care-fraud
