The Department of Justice recently announced that a home-health services company has agreed to pay over $45,000 to resolve alleged False Claims Act (“FCA”) violations. Professional Family Care Services, Inc. (“PFCS”), a North Carolina corporation, faced allegations of fraudulent billing for work by an employee that was convicted of wire fraud and sentenced to prison for her role in the alleged scheme.
For two years starting in 2015, PFCS billed the Department of Veterans Affairs (the “VA”) for home-health services related to the medical care of an Army veteran identified by the initials W.R. While PFCS was billing the VA for home-health services, W.R. was actually residing with a Certified Nursing Aide. Relevant evidence indicated that PFCS was billing the VA based on falsified timesheets provided by the aide, for example, timesheets showing her providing services to W.R. and another patient simultaneously. As a result, VA alleged that PFCS failed to provide W.R. with the time and quality of care required under the VA program.
W.R. was eventually admitted to the hospital, where it was discovered that W.R. was extremely malnourished and died shortly after. Following the death of W.R., PFCS submitted 15 separate claim forms seeking payment from the VA for the services provided by the aide totaling $11,273.92.
Under 31 U.S.C. § 3729(a)(1), civil FCA claims may lead to treble damages in addition to other penalties for false or fraudulent claims. As a result, PFCS agreed to...
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