$5.2m Medicare Fraud Lands Nigerian Princewill  Njoku  In US Jail for 108 Months

Department of Justice

The former co-owner of a Houston-area home health care company, Mr. Princewill Njoku, has been sentenced to 108 months in prison in Houston for his participation in a $5.2 million Medicare fraud scheme, announced the Department of Justice, the FBI and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).

Princewill Njoku, a former co-owner and administrator at Family Healthcare Group, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Nancy Atlas in the Southern District of Texas to 108 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release.

The accused person who is also a Nigerian was ordered to pay $5.1 million in restitution jointly and severally with his co-defendants.

 In January 2011, Njoku pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit health care fraud, one count of conspiracy to pay illegal kickbacks to patient recruiters and sixteen counts of paying such illegal kickbacks.

 According to court documents and other evidence presented to the court, Family Healthcare Group, a Houston home health care company, purported to provide skilled nursing to Medicare beneficiaries.

 According to the evidence, Princewill Njoku paid co-conspirators to recruit Medicare beneficiaries for the purpose of Family Healthcare Group filing claims with Medicare for skilled nursing that was medically unnecessary or not provided. Njoku and his co-conspirators then falsified documents to support the fraudulent payments from Medicare.

 Njoku is the ninth defendant sentenced in connection with this scheme, including Njoku’s co-owner, Clifford Ubani, who also received a 108 month sentence earlier this month. One remaining defendant awaits sentencing.

The sentence was announced by the Assistant Attorney General Lanny A. Breuer of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division; U.S. Attorney Kenneth Magidson of the Southern District of Texas; Special Agent-In-Charge Stephen L. Morris of the FBI’s Houston Field Office; Special Agent-in-Charge Mike Fields of the Dallas Regional Office of HHS’s Office of the Inspector General (HHS-OIG) and the Texas Attorney General’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit (MFCU).

 Just on Friday, Kenneth Ibezim Anokam, 57, a naturalized U.S. citizen from Nigeria was handed a 151-month federal prison term for his role in a massive health care fraud conspiracy that billed the Medicare and Medicaid programs for more than $45 million over a 2 ½ year period.