From the Arizona Republic, July 1:
- A man operating from Pakistan, Farrukh Ali, was indicted for allegedly defrauding Arizona's Medicaid system of $564 million through false drug and alcohol treatment claims.
- The alleged fraud represents about 20% of the estimated $2.5 billion lost in Arizona's "sober living" scheme.
- Ali's alleged fraud dwarfs other cases in the scheme, with the next highest individual amount being $54 million.
A man operating from Pakistan fleeced more than $560 million from Arizona's safety-net health care system by sending in false claims for drug and alcohol treatment, according to a grand jury indictment filed in federal court.
Arizona authorities have investigated businesses associated with the man, Farrukh Ali, for two years. They had not brought charges against him until the June grand jury indictment.
The purported fraudulent billings paid to Ali would represent a staggering 20% of the entire statewide "sober living" scheme, which authorities have said involved as much as $2.5 billion.
It is not clear if authorities have arrested Ali. His business, Pro MD Solutions, was incorporated in Arizona, but the indictment said he operated it from Pakistan.
Ali signed contracts with health care clinics, agreeing to handle the billing for a cut of the profits.
He submitted $650 million in fraudulent claims, according to the indictment. Of those claims, Arizona's Medicaid program, the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System, paid out $564 million.
Ali personally garnered $24.5 million of that money, the indictment says, and used $2.9 million of the fraudulently-obtained proceeds to buy a home on a golf course in Dubai.
The indictment was filed under seal June 11. It is not clear when it was unsealed, or why.
No attorney was listed for Ali. No hearing dates were listed in the court docket. A spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office for Arizona did not return an email June 30 seeking comment about the case or Ali’s whereabouts.
Ali's tally of alleged fraudulent bills is, by far, the largest that authorities in Arizona have attributed to a single individual.
Other people were charged in cases with sums of $18 million or $30 million. In May, a former nurse practitioner named Rita Anagho pleaded guilty in a scheme involving $54 million in false billings. At the time, that appeared as the largest figure associated with a single individual.
Anagho's clinic was among the clients of Ali.
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