Prosecutors say a San Francisco-based firm drastically overbilled taxpayers for government employee spinal implants.
Santa Clara County prosecutors filed fraud charges on Wednesday against 67-year-old Implantium chief Trudy Maurer and the firm’s 39-year-old medical director Tigram Shahsuvarya.
They are expected to enter pleas next week to nine felony fraud charges each. They face up to 13 years in prison if convicted.
San Jose Mercury News ( http://bit.ly/JHpH09) says Implantium is a billing company for spinal surgeries.
The firm buys implant devices from manufacturers and supplies them to hospitals, where they are implanted into the backs of injured workers.
Implantium bills workers’ compensation insurance carriers for the devices and is allowed by law to make $250 profit per device.
Prosecutors say invoices were altered up to tens of thousands of dollars.
Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2012/04/26/state/n053044D62.DTL#ixzz1tA3kIui9
