Indictment: Wichita Chiropractor Defrauded Health Insurers

WICHITA, KAN. – A federal indictment charging a Wichita chiropractor in a $1.3 million health care fraud scheme was unsealed today, U.S. Attorney Barry Grissom. The chiropractor surrendered his license today.

Jeffrey D. Fenn, 32, Wichita, Kansas, was charged with six counts of health care fraud, two counts of aggravated identity theft, one count of illegally obtaining controlled drugs, sixteen counts of money laundering and one count of tax evasion.

The indictment alleges that beginning in March 2011 Fenn devised and executed a scheme to defraud health care benefit programs of more than $1.3 million through his businesses, including Wichita Health and Wellness, Fenn Chiropractic, P.A. and Wichita Pain Associates, P.A. Fenn submitted false claims to Medicare, Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Kansas and Coventry Health Care of Kansas, Inc., and the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program.

The indictment alleges Fenn was responsible for submitting false claims for health care services including:

• Nerve block injections where none were performed.
• Fine needle aspirations where none were performed.
• Nerve conduction tests when the tests were not performed by properly certified personnel.
• Services ostensibly provided by physicians when they were not present at the clinic.
• Services that were medically unnecessary.

Fenn developed what he called an “integrated practice,” hiring physicians, advanced registered nurse practitioners and physical therapists and ostensibly having them perform procedures he was not qualified to perform. He misrepresented to the Kansas Board of Healing Arts that medical doctors had an ownership in his clinic. He used the names of physicians he employed to submit false claims for services.

The tax evasion count alleges he overstated his business deductions for 2011 by $367,800. He claimed business deductions for what were in fact personal expenses. For example, $9,400 he claimed for purchasing a server actually was used to make a down payment on a residential lot in Wichita. The $15,100 he claimed for advertising actually was used to make a down payment on a ski boat.

Upon conviction, the crimes carry the following penalties:

• Health care fraud: A maximum penalty of 10 years in federal prison and a fine up to $250,000 on each count.
• Aggravated identity theft: A mandatory two years to run consecutively to the underlying sentence on each count.
• Illegally obtaining controlled drugs: A maximum penalty of four years and a fine up to $250,000.
• Money laundering: A maximum penalty of 10 years in federal prison and a fine up to $250,000 on each count.
• Tax evasion: A maximum penalty of five years and a fine up to $100,000.

Health and Human Services, Office of Inspector General, Office of Investigations, the FBI, Defense Criminal Investigative Service, the Food and Drug Administration and the Internal Revenue Service investigated. Assistant U.S. Attorney Tanya Treadway is prosecuting.