A Somali-owned company may have defrauded Maine in a manner similar to schemes that ripped off at least $1 billion from Minnesota, a whistleblower told NewsNation Monday.
Christopher Bernardini, a former “billing guru” at Gateway Community Services, said that the company falsified documents to obtain payment from Maine’s Medicaid program for services to low-income and disabled clients, NewsNation reported. Abdullahi Ali, the owner of the company, reportedly ran for office in Jubaland, a region of Somalia, and boasted about funding a militia there, according to The Maine Wire.
“I have a passion for helping people and I thought that we were doing the right thing this whole time,” Bernardini told NewsNation, later adding, “When I had clients calling me to tell me their staff hadn’t shown up and I was told to bill those hours anyway. It just got worse and worse until I started really putting up a stink.”
I worked for a local “ptemier” assisted living facility, who were billing medicaid for residents who were in the hospital and not in the facility.
I quit, because it was billed under my credentials and I wasn’t getting involved in that.
It’s always the employee that “pays” for the fraud as management claims ignorance, but are threatening you with your job if you don’t do it.