In the USA, a "kickback" is a benefit passed to someone in return for placing contracts. It's a bribe but in the USA, there's a federal law defining it as a specific offence. 

Earlier this week, Oleg Beretsky was charged in Brooklyn, New York, with conspiracy to commit "healthcare fraud", conspiring to commit an offence under the Anti Kickback Statute (? - this is what the Department of Justice calls it) and conspiracy to commit money laundering.

Arrested in Florida, Beretsky will appear in court in New York at a later date. First he must be extradited.

The Department of Justice made its case in an indictment that has now been unsealed. It alleges "elderly individuals trusted the defendant to help them with their health care decisions.  Rather than look out for the interests of some of the most vulnerable members of our community, he sold access to those who trusted him to the highest bidder,” stated United States Attorney Durham. “The defendant compounded his crimes by encouraging doctors and health care providers who became part of his scheme to cheat Medicare by billing for work that was not needed or never performed."

“The defendant and his conspirators are accused of pocketing more than USD12 million while exploiting the unknowing, innocent public, including victims from immigrant communities,” stated HSI New York Special Agent in Charge Alfonso.  “As alleged, he took advantage of people with whom he had forged relationships — only to manipulate them into using certain doctors and services for his lucrative benefit."

It is alleged that from January 2017 to April 2024, Beretsky and his conspirators engaged in a health care fraud, kickback and money laundering scheme.  Beretsky was the owner of Obest, Inc., a company in Plainview, New York, that purported to provide health care professionals with billing, consulting and support services.  In reality, Obest’s principal business consisted of referring elderly Medicare patients to doctors and other health care professionals in exchange for kickbacks and bribes.  Many of these patients were immigrants from the former Soviet Union, who Beretsky identified through an employee of a non-profit social service agency that provided housing and other services to senior citizens in Brooklyn and Queens. Beretsky cultivated relationships with many of these patients, which he used to gain control over decisions regarding their health care providers.  Beretsky then used that control to ensure that only doctors and other providers—including social workers, pain specialists and diagnostic companies—who were willing to pay him would have access to the patients.  On at least one occasion, Beretsky threatened a patient who wanted to continue seeing a provider who had stopped paying kickbacks to the defendant.

The fee charged by Beretsky was typically based either on how many patients Beretsky referred to the provider or how much Medicare reimbursed the provider for services purportedly rendered to the patients.  To generate more fees for himself and his conspirators, Beretsky often encouraged or directed providers to bill Medicare for patients who did not need the services those providers rendered and, in some cases, services that were not rendered at all.  In total, doctors and providers who participated in Beretsky’s scheme billed more than USD22 million in false and fraudulent claims to Medicare.  Of that more than USD22 million, Medicare paid more than USD12.4 million in claims, which was distributed to Beretsky and his conspirators.  To hide the illegal source of funds Beretsky received from the conspiracy, Beretsky frequently directed conspirators to pay his relatives in cash and transferred money to multiple accounts held in the names of his family members.

US Medicaid is a frequent victim of fraud, as World Money Laundering Report has demonstrated over many years.  What is surprising is that the nature of the frauds, and the functions of those involved, has not changed in all those years leading to the question: why does Medicaid not identify frauds before they are complete?