|
Federal authorities say two of Medicare's most-wanted fugitives may be hiding out in Glendale.
Healthcare investigators say Karo Gotti Blkhoyan, 32, and Anush Sahakyan, 29, set up a phony medical clinic in South Carolina from 2009 to 2010 and billed for $1.3 million in false claims. Medicare paid out more than $300,000.
The pair, indicted last year on charges including healthcare fraud and money laundering, used the stolen identities of Medicare patients in California and New York, officials said.
"We have information through witnesses that they are in the Glendale area," said Su Kim, a special agent in South Carolina with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' inspector general.
The inspector general's office launched its most-wanted list in 2011, and 41 fugitives have been captured thus far. There are more than 170 fugitives on the list, officials said.
The giant healthcare program has been a tempting target for criminals for years. Medicare processes about 2.9 million claims daily and 10,000 seniors join the rolls every day.
ALSO:
Small surgeries, huge markups
Tax help comes with health insurance advice
Former L.A. clinic owner makes Medicare's most-wanted list
Follow Chad Terhune on Twitter
Comments are filtered for language and registration is required. The Times makes no guarantee of comments' factual accuracy. Readers may report inappropriate comments by clicking the Report Abuse link next to a comment. Here are the full legal terms you agree to by using this comment form.
';
shareDiv.innerHTML = templateHTML;
/* append the new div to the end of the document, which is hidden already with CSS */
document.body.appendChild(shareDiv);
/* Store the div in both a regular JavaScript variable and as a jQuery object so we can reference them faster later */
var shareTip = document.getElementById('shareTip'),
$shareTip = $('#shareTip');
/* This extends our settings object with any user-defined settings passed to the function and returns the jQuery object shareTip
was called on */
return this.each(function() {
if (options) {
$.extend(settings, options);
}
/* This is a hack to make sure the shareTip always fades back to 100% opacity */
var checkOpacity = function (){
if ( $shareTip.css('opacity') !== 1 ){
$shareTip.css({'opacity': 1});
}
};
/* Function that replaces the HTML in the shareTip with the template we defined at the top */
/* It will wipe/reset the links on the social media buttons each time the function is called */
var removeLinks = function (){
shareTip.innerHTML = templateHTML;
};
/* This is the function that makes the links for the Tweet / Share functionality */
var makeURLS = function (link, message){
/* Here we construct the Tweet URL using an array, with values passed to the function */
var tweetConstruct = [
'http://twitter.com/share?url=', link, '&text=', message, '&via=', settings.twitter_account
],
/* Then join the array into one chunk of HTML */
tweetURL = tweetConstruct.join(''),
/* Same story for Facebook */
fbConstruct = [
'http://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?u=', link, '&src=sp'
],
fbURL = fbConstruct.join(''),
newHTML = [
''
],
shareHTML = newHTML.join('');
/* Load in our new HTML */
shareTip.innerHTML = shareHTML;
};
/* Since the shareTip will automatically fade out when the user mouses out of an element */
/* we have to specifically tell the shareTip we want it to stay put when the user mouses over it */
/* This effectively gives the user a 500 ms (or whatever) window to mouse */
/* from the element to the shareTip to prevent it from popping out */
$shareTip.hover(function(){
$shareTip.stop(true, true);
$shareTip.show();
checkOpacity();
}, function(){
$(this).fadeOut(settings.speed);
});
/* This function handles the hover action */
$(this).hover(function(){
/* remove the old links, so someone doesn't accidentally click on them */
removeLinks();
/* If there's already an animation running on the shareTip, stop it */
$shareTip.stop(true, true);
var eso = $(this),
message,
/* Store the width and height of the shareTip and the offset of the element for our calculations */
height = eso.height(),
width = eso.width(),
offset = eso.offset(),
link;
link = eso.children('a').attr('href');
message = escape( eso.find('img').attr('alt') ) || eso.attr(settings.message_attr);
if (link.search('http://') === -1){
link = 'http://www.latimes.com' + link;
}
link = encodeURIComponent(link);
/* If it's at the top of the page, the shareTip will pop under the element */
if (offset.top
2 fugitives accused of Medicare fraud may be in Glendale, U.S. says
This article
2 fugitives accused of Medicare fraud may be in Glendale, U.S. says
can be opened in url
https://newscrawles.blogspot.com/2013/02/2-fugitives-accused-of-medicare-fraud.html
2 fugitives accused of Medicare fraud may be in Glendale, U.S. says
