US Attorney's Office, Middle District of Louisiana, Sept. 27, 2022
After a week-long trial, a federal jury convicted the former CEO of St. Gabriel Health Clinic Inc. for conducting a multi-year, multi-million-dollar scheme to defraud the Louisiana Medicaid Program.
According to court documents and evidence presented at trial, Victor Clark Kirk of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, was the CEO of St. Gabriel Health Clinic Inc. (St. Gabriel), a Louisiana non-profit corporation that provided health care services to Medicaid recipients and others. St. Gabriel was a federally qualified health center (FQHC) that contracted with the Iberville Parish School Board to provide medical services within the school district. As a FQHC, St. Gabriel could provide primary care services to students as well as services related to the diagnosis and treatment of mental illnesses – provided that such services were medically necessary – among other requirements.
Evidence at trial showed that St. Gabriel practitioners, at Kirk’s direction, provided character development and other educational programs to entire classrooms of students during regular class periods. Kirk then caused the fraudulent billing of these programs to Medicaid as group psychotherapy. To facilitate the fraudulent scheme, Kirk directed that St. Gabriel practitioners falsely diagnose students with mental health disorders. From 2011 through 2015, Kirk caused over $1.8 million in fraudulent claims for purported group psychotherapy services.
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