Trio Involved in $40 Million, Nationwide Medicare Scam

HHS Office of Inspector General | Jan 2013

In September 2010, Lilit Galstyan, Julieta Ghazaryan, and Marine Movsisyan were indicted on charges of health care fraud, conspiracy to commit mail fraud, wire fraud, and conspiracy to commit money laundering. Galstyan, Ghazaryan, and Movsisyan, along with their co-conspirators, allegedly billed Medicare, using stolen provider identities, for more than $40 million in false claims for services that were never rendered.

According to the indictment, Galstyan, Ghazaryan, Movsisyan and their co-conspirators allegedly stole personal identifying information of physicians and Medicare beneficiaries to submit claims to Medicare for equipment for beneficiaries whom the physicians never saw. They also allegedly employed visa holders from eastern European countries and used the visa holders' identities to submit false claims to Medicare for services never rendered.

Although the crime ring was based in the Los Angeles area, investigators believe that the trio and their co-conspirators traveled throughout the country to open fake businesses. These "false fronts" were opened in over 40 States and were located far from the physicians' actual practices in order to conceal the false billings from the physicians. The locations served as "mail drops" so that the conspirators could receive documents used to further the scheme, including Medicare correspondence and bank checks, according to the indictment.

Investigators believe that the trio and their co-conspirators received more than $19 million in reimbursements from Medicare for services that were never provided. A large portion of the profits from the alleged schemes were laundered through shell businesses owned by the visa holders, according to the indictment.

Co-conspirators Eduard Oganesyan and Karen Chilyan previously pled guilty and were sentenced to 11 years' and 8 years' incarceration, respectively. In addition, Oganesyan and Chilyan were ordered to pay joint and several restitution in the amounts of $10.6 million and $7.7 million, respectively. A third co-conspirator, Arus Gyulbudakyan, also previously pled guilty and was sentenced to 13 months' imprisonment and ordered to pay $500,000 in restitution, joint and several. Gyulbudakyan will be deported to Armenia after she has served her time in jail.

Galstyan, Ghazaryan, and Movsisyan remain at large.

As posted at OIG: https://oig.hhs.gov/fraud/fugitives/profiles.asp#galstyan