Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit, with the assistance of the Orlando Police Department, today arrested two individuals for participating in a scheme to defraud the Medicaid program using teenagers’ personal identity information. Wendy Leiba of Longwood, 53, and Bobby Lyons of Winter Garden, 50, allegedly assisted Orlando-based companies to fraudulently bill Medicaid more than $500,000 for services not rendered. An additional participant in this scheme, Brian Craig of Sanford, 40, is at large.
A MFCU investigation into the false and fraudulent billing by Revive Athletics, Divine Consulting and Durden Consulting, led to the recent two arrests. These companies provided Medicaid for behavioral health services primarily in the Orlando area. According to the investigation, Craig and Leiba, both case management supervisors at Divine Consulting, billed for services not provided and not medically necessary. Lyons, who runs the Young Men of Promise program through the Orange County School system, allegedly sold high school students’ identity information to Divine Consulting and Revive Athletics. The companies allegedly billed Medicaid for services to these students, but the students never received the services.
MFCU previously arrested five other individuals in connection to this case. For more information on the previous arrests, click here.
Leiba faces one count of organized scheme to defraud, a third degree felony. If convicted, Leiba faces up to five years in prison and $5,000 in fines. Lyons faces one count of Medicaid provider fraud, a first-degree felony, one count of criminal use of personal identification information, a first-degree felony, and one count of organized scheme to defraud, a third degree felony. If convicted, Lyons faces up to 55 years in prison, with a minimum mandatory sentence of at least five years.
SOURCE: Attorney General Pam Bondi