A New Mexico healthcare provider has settled a case that alleged the company scammed millions from the state’s Medicaid program.
A former senior executive for Lovelace Inc., Duke Rodriguez, claimed that the insurer collected New Mexico gross receipts taxes from Medicaid for services it provided to program recipients – even though Lovelace was exempt from paying those taxes. Lovelace allegedly pocketed the money it was supposedly collecting for state taxes.
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The New Mexico Attorney General’s Office alleged that Lovelace, its parent company Ardent Health Services, and former parent Cigna, had fraudulently collected at least $142.6 million in gross tax receipts from Medicaid, according to a San Francisco Chronicle report.
However, the state AG settled with the companies for far less than the amount they were alleged to have taken. Lovelace and Ardent paid the state $2 million, and paid $500,000 to Rodriguez under a state whistleblower law. Cigna paid the state about $39,000 and Rodriguez around $8,000, the Chronicle reported. The companies denied any wrongdoing in the settlement agreements.
However, officials with the office of the attorney general recently said they had received additional information from Lovelace that said the company had wrongly retained just $1.6 million in gross receipts taxes.
“We collected well beyond the gross receipts taxes that were paid,” said Sharon Pino, New Mexico’s deputy attorney general for criminal affairs. Pino said that Rodriguez’s claims were ultimately unproven.
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