Tenet Hospital CEO And Other Executives Indicted In $400 Million Alleged Bribery Scheme

What Happened?

Last week, Bill Moore, a former CEO of a Georgia-based health care provider, Tenet Healthcare Corporation, was indicted for his alleged role in a $400 million fraud and bribery scheme.  The indictment – actually a superseding indictment in a case that began in January 2017 – was filed on September 27 in federal court in the Northern District of Georgia.

The Rundown.

Besides Moore, the indictment also named two co-defendants:  Edmundo Cota, the president and CEO of Hispanic Medical Management, Inc., and John Holland, a former senior vice resident of Tenet’s Southern States Region.  Holland was the sole defendant in the case until Moore and Cota were named in the superseding indictment.

The indictment claims that Moore, Cota and Holland conspired to defraud Tenet patients, the United States, and the South Carolina and Georgia Medicaid programs through the payment of bribes by Holland and Moore in return for the referral of patients to Tenet hospitals in the Southern States Region.  It is also alleged that Holland and Moore took affirmative steps within Tenet to conceal the scheme through circumventing internal accounting controls, falsification of Tenet’s books and records, and false representations to the United States.  The alleged false representations included those made by Holland to HHS-OIG concerning Tenet’s 2006 Corporate Integrity Agreement, through which he certified that Tenet was compliant with participation requirements of Medicare and Medicaid.  The alleged bribes resulted in over $400 million claims for services by Tenet to Georgia and South Carolina for which Tenet received over $149 million from the resulting referrals.

What Happens Next?

The district court judge, the Hon. Amy Totenberg, will preside over the case, which can be found at No. 1:17-CR-00234.  There are no pending deadlines or events on the docket at present.