Solomon Nathaniel, Medicare Fraud, Michigan 2009

DETROIT, Mich. – A Detroit-area physical therapist has been sentenced to 62 months in prison and ordered to pay $2,875,000 in restitution for his role in a wide-ranging conspiracy to defraud the Medicare program.

Solomon Nathaniel, a licensed physical therapist from Sterling Heights, Mich., pleaded guilty on Oct. 19, 2009, in the Eastern District of Michigan to conspiracy to commit health care fraud. Nathaniel admitted that he began working in approximately December 2003 as a contract therapist for co-conspirator Suresh Chand.

According to his plea documents, Nathaniel admitted that he, Chand and others created fictitious therapy files appearing to document physical and occupational therapy services provided to Medicare beneficiaries, when in fact no such services had been provided. Nathaniel signed approximately 1,250 fictitious physical therapy files, indicating that he had provided physical therapy services to Medicare beneficiaries, when in fact he had not.

Nathaniel admitted that he was paid between $90 and $110 for each file he falsified. Nathaniel also admitted that between approximately December 2003 and July 2006, he falsified physical therapy files that supported claims to the Medicare program totaling approximately $6,250,000. Medicare paid approximately $2,875,000 on those claims.

Nathaniel admitted that throughout the conspiracy he was fully aware that Medicare was being billed for physical therapy services that he falsely indicated he had performed.

U.S. District Judge Sean F. Cox also ordered Nathaniel to serve a three-year term of supervised release following his incarceration.

The case was prosecuted by Senior Trial Attorney John K. Neal of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section and by Special Assistant U.S. Attorney Thomas W. Beimers of the Eastern District of Michigan. The FBI and HHS-OIG conducted the investigation.

This case was brought as part of the Medicare Fraud Strike Force, supervised by the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Michigan.

Since their inception in March 2007, Strike Force operations in seven districts have obtained indictments of more than 500 individuals who collectively have falsely billed the Medicare program for more than $1.1 billion.

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