Investigative Press Releases
Thursday, October 21, 2021
LAS VEGAS, Nev. – An undocumented individual pleaded guilty today to conspiracy to use over 100 victims’ identities (without their consent) to unlawfully submit fraudulent unemployment insurance benefits claims, totaling at least $934,129.
Thursday, October 21, 2021
Jacksonville, Florida – Billy Micah Sermons (44, Jacksonville) has pleaded guilty to making a false statement to the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA), a federal agency. Sermons faces a maximum penalty of five years in federal prison and payment of restitution to the federal government. A sentencing date has not yet been set.
Thursday, October 21, 2021
DENVER –The Center for Severe Weather Research (CSWR), a nonprofit organization in Boulder, Colorado, has paid over $2.4 million to resolve allegations that it engaged in fraud related to grants it received from three federal agencies: the National Science Foundation (NSF), the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), an agency within the U.S. Department of Commerce.
Wednesday, October 20, 2021
Jacksonville, Florida – A federal jury has found Scott Balotin (51, St. Johns) and Thomas Jones (52, Jacksonville) guilty of conspiracy to commit health care fraud and money laundering. Each faces a maximum penalty of 10 years in federal prison. The sentencing hearings are scheduled for January 18, 2022.
Balotin and Jones had been indicted on October 30, 2019.
Wednesday, October 20, 2021
A con artist who defrauded a man out of $4.5 million and defrauded banks out of $3.9 million pleaded guilty Tuesday in U.S. District Court, announced Acting U.S. Attorney Clint Johnson.
William Brian Mulder, 63, of Tulsa, pleaded guilty to causing the interstate transmission of moneys taken by fraud and money laundering.
Wednesday, October 20, 2021
Columbia, South Carolina---- Acting United States Attorney M. Rhett DeHart announced today that Colonial Family Practice, LLC, a physician-owned primary and urgent care practice with multiple clinics in South Carolina, has agreed to a $1.25 million settlement to resolve allegations that it violated the False Claims Act by billing Medicare, Medicaid, and TRICARE for medically unnecessary services.
Wednesday, October 20, 2021
Leonard C Boyle, United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut, David Sundberg, Special Agent in Charge of the New Haven Division of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and Christina D. Scaringi, Special Agent in Charge of the Office of Inspector General, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, announced that MICHAEL DiMASSA, 30, of West Haven, was arrested today on a federal criminal complaint charging him with defrauding the City of West Haven of more than $600,000.
Wednesday, October 20, 2021
BOISE – Two Chicago women pleaded guilty to bank fraud.
Wednesday, October 20, 2021
BOSTON – A Nevada-based clinical laboratory, MD Spine Solutions LLC, d/b/a MD Labs Inc., and two of its owners and co-founders have agreed to resolve allegations that MD Labs submitted false claims for payment to Medicare, Medicaid, and other federal health care programs.
MD Labs, along with its owners and co-founders, Denis Grizelj and Matthew Rutledge, will pay up to $16 million to settle this matter.
Wednesday, October 20, 2021
LAFAYETTE, La. - Acting United States Attorney Alexander C. Van Hook announced that Burnell Gabriel Zachary, 37, of Arnaudville, Louisiana, has pleaded guilty before United States Magistrate Judge Carol Whitehurst to receiving Coronavirus Food Assistance Program payments to which he was not entitled.