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Yesterday the Justice Department announced that it charged Esformes with a One Billion dollar Fraud Medicare FRaud Scheme. Take a look at the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times for today.
The Esformes nursing homes have been infamous here in Chicago and the relationship between them and the elder cleansing scandal notorious. Alice Gore was one of the notable alleged victims and blogs and public access television has fought the news blackout with valor. How often does anyone steal a billion dollars? Even the Clinton's with their $250,000 speeches, foundation conduit, etc are no so bold or so callous. But - the Saturday newspapers of Chicago have barely a mention!
The past few months have demonstrated that the 'great unwashed' are restless and want HONEST and responsive government, public institutions, and judiciary. The crafty from whom Justice can be purchased is no longer admired. The double speak and double dealing political miscreant who promises the world and delivers a cesspool no longer has the large following that is mesmerized by the words ******* and *******. People no longer look to the mainstream media for their filtered news and even the New York Times has financial problems. Here in Chicago is not conceivable that we are to become a town with no daily newspaper (such as the Suntimes/Tribune)
It is a shame! But with the political and judicial elite being a able to cover-up their amoral and criminal conduct because the mainstream media desires to control thought by discriminating journalism (i.e. protecting the elite from bad publicity). The fact is that any mention of bad conduct by the political and judicial elite that fortuitously occurs - i.e. they get caught - is suppressed.
The most recent example is found in the JoAnne Denison disciplinary case. Forget about the fact that everything she did was appropriate and as a good citizen she had an obligation to do. Forget about the fact that blatantly openly and notoriously her appropriate conduct was derogatorily labeled. (yelling fire in a crowded theater equated to exposing judicial corruption). Forget about the fact that the actions of the Attorney Registration and Disciplinary commission not only told lies about her, subordinated perjury, abdicated its official duties, and lied to Supreme Court as to the holdings of the SCOTUS, and the facts.
Forget about the fact that the American Bar Association, the Illinois Bar Association, ***** all were good little Nazis and sat silent. Forget all about that!
It used to be if a man bit a dog it was news, and the New York Times printed it under the heading of all the news meant to be printed.
Fast forward to 2016. The Illinois legislature determined that to protect the public and preserve some integrity in the legal process Court reporters have to be licensed. (The legislature wanting to make certain that Reports of Proceedings were no edited so as to change testimony - see the testimony of Judge Stuart and the editing out of her admission to lying under oath during direct testimony). The IARDC has been formed to protect the public from dishonest lawyers whether practicing law or on the bench. (Ask Mr. Larkin and his cronies as to what their mission is!)
It appears in documents that the IARDC filed before the Supreme Court of Illinois in ex-parte proceedings that should never have been ex-parte, that unlicensed court reporters were engaged by the IARDC. Yes, the IARDC admits that they hired unlicensed court reporters. Their excuse - we need time to think of an excuse, or how to cover up the violation of law!
The story that is suppressed! Jerome Larkin, that bastion of the morality of the 2nd oldest profession, dipped into public funds to make illegal payments. Jerome Larkin, like the GAL who supervised the prospecting for gold in the mouth of Alice Gore, teaches legal ethics in the official Illinois Continuing Legal Education program.
No - you cannot make this stuff up! Even the cover-up of one hell of story of Illinois corruption cannot kill the outrage that Larkin's theft of public funds is causing or the fact that local law enforcement is disinterested.
We are citizens are creating a hue and cry. If you read the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times it appears that we are accepting his outrage in the very same manner as we accept the South and West sides of our City of Chicago being turned into war zones. Or maybe NOT!
We shall see *******.
Ken Ditkowsky
From: kenneth ditkowsky <kenditkowsky@yahoo.com>
To: Donald J. Trump <donald.j.trump@donaldtrump.
Cc: JoAnne M. Denison <joanne@justice4every1.com>; Janet Phelan <janet_c_phelan@yahoo.com>;
Sent: Friday, July 22, 2016 8:34 PM
Subject: Re: Thank you Attorney General Lynch
from the Wall Street Journal 0
Justice Department Charges Three in $1 Billion Medicare Fraud Scheme in Florida
Prosecutors outline details of its largest-ever single criminal health-care fraud case
Philip Esformes arrives at a gala in Los Angeles on Aug. 7, 2015. Mr. Esformes, the owner of more than 30 Miami-area skilled nursing and assisted-living facilities, was the scheme’s mastermind, the indictment alleged. PHOTO: ROB LATOUR/INVISION/AP
The Justice Department on Friday unsealed charges in its largest-ever criminal health-care-fraud case, charging three individuals with using a network of doctors, hospitals and health-care providers across South Florida to improperly bill more than $1 billion to Medicare and Medicaid.
Philip Esformes, the owner of more than 30 Miami-area skilled-nursing and assisted-living facilities, was the project’s mastermind, the indictment alleged. He and two co-defendants, along with other co-conspirators, allegedly paid and received bribes and kickbacks to get thousands of patients admitted to facilities Mr. Esformes controlled.
In those facilities, they were often given medically unnecessary and sometimes harmful treatments, which were then billed to Medicare and Medicaid, according to court papers.
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Esformes attorneys Marissel Descalzo and Michael Pasano of Carlton Fields said their client “adamantly denies these allegations and will fight hard to clear his name.”
The case was brought as part of an interagency Medicare Fraud Strike Force, which operates in nine locations across the country, officials said. Since its creation in March 2007, the task force has charged nearly 2,900 defendants who have collectively billed the Medicare program for more than $10 billion, they said.
Fraud continues to plague the roughly $600 billion Medicare program, though new criminal cases have slowed in recent years. Fraud enforcers have brought fewer cases since 2013, but convictions and settlements since the start of the decade have netted Medicare between $1 billion and $2.5 billion annually, according to a report from the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of the Inspector General.
Last year, Medicare took in $1.6 billion from fraud-enforcement efforts and Medicaid scored another $135.9 million, according to the report. The figures don’t include what states won in Medicaid-fraud cases. Medicaid, which helps pay for health care for the needy, aged, blind and disabled, and for low-income families with children, is partially financed by states.
“The conspirators were ruthlessly efficient” as they used the scheme to line their pockets with tens of millions of dollars, said Assistant Attorney General Leslie R. Caldwell at a news conference in Miami regarding the latest case.
She was joined by officials from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the inspector general, or in-house watchdog, of the Department of Health and Human Services, which investigated the case.
Ms. Caldwell detailed how conspirators in the latest case allegedly arranged from 2009 to 2016 to have patients moved between facilities after they had reached Medicare-imposed limits on their length of stay. In some cases, patients who were drug addicts were prescribed opioids—including OxyContin and Fentanyl—to entice them to stay in the facilities, she said.
As part of the plan, Mr. Esformes also received bribes and kickbacks from other health providers to refer patients to them, prosecutors said. These bribes were disguised as payments to unnamed escorts flown into Orlando and transported to a hotel by limousine, payments to a basketball coach for Mr. Esformes’s son and as charitable donations, the court documents allege.
Mr. Esformes, along with hospital administrator Odette Barcha and physician assistantArnaldo Carmouze, were charged with money laundering and conspiracy to defraud the U.S. and pay and receive health-care kickbacks, among other charges. The identities of attorneys representing Ms. Barcha and Mr. Carmouze weren’t immediately known.
Assistant Attorney General Leslie R. Caldwell, shown in May 2015, called the defendants in Friday’s indictment ‘ruthlessly efficient.’ PHOTO:CLIFF OWEN/ASSOCIATED PRESS
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