They Billed $1.6 Billion for Addiction Treatment That Never Happened

Описание: They Billed $1.6 Billion for Addiction Treatment That Never Happened

They billed $1.6 billion for addiction treatment that never happened — the largest sober-home fraud the Justice Department has ever prosecuted.

On Thursday, the Justice Department announced charges against 15 defendants, including six medical professionals, in Los Angeles health care fraud schemes that collectively resulted in over $1.8 billion in fraudulent claims to government and private health care programs. Eight defendants were arrested the same day.

The substance abuse scheme, as alleged: David and Nathan Young controlled dozens of purported treatment companies in the Los Angeles area and around the country. Their body brokers targeted vulnerable people — individuals who were unhoused and in poverty, and individuals attending substance abuse support groups — and lured them to California with free flights, money, apartments, hotel stays, cars, gift cards and drugs. Premium patients got hotels and dinners; non-premium patients got cramped, derelict housing described as 'trap houses.' Patients were recycled through facilities so billing never stopped, allegedly drugged to keep them from leaving, and the billed 'therapy' was a Zoom session with more than a hundred attendees they could skip to lay out on the beach.

Also charged: a $134 million scheme billing Medicare for unnecessary atherectomy (artery) procedures that resulted in injury to patients, identified through data analytics; over $138 million in hospice fraud billed for patients who were not terminally ill; and a nearly $270 million Medi-Cal pharmacy scheme built on bogus prescriptions, of which Medi-Cal paid at least $178 million.

The steelman is in the video too: addiction treatment is underfunded and hard to reach, and fraud headlines can scare people away from real help. And plainly: these are charges, not convictions — every defendant is presumed innocent until proven guilty.

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Sources: U.S. Department of Justice press release (Oct 22, 2026) · HHS Office of Inspector General enforcement action (Oct 22, 2026)

AI-assisted video and audio — but the sources are human, and the facts are very real.