By Laura French
GREENVILLE, N.C. — A North Carolina ambulance company manager has been sentenced for stealing more than $4.7 million through Medicare fraud and identity theft.
Davon Terrell Henderson, 32, who was the manager of Med-1 Interfacility Care, was ordered to serve 64 months in prison and three years on supervised release after billing Medicare contractor Humana for fictitious ambulance services, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office of the Eastern District of North Carolina.
“Medicare entrusts its providers to only bill taxpayers for the work that they actually perform. In this case, the defendants blatantly abused that trust, stealing millions from taxpayers in the form of fake ambulance services,” said U.S. Attorney Robert J. Higdon Jr. in a statement.
Between 2014 and 2016 Henderson and Med-1 billing clerk Pamel Dewitt Babb paid others to steal identification numbers from Humana and Medicare beneficiaries, mostly from assisted living facilities, according to investigators. The total amount billed using the stolen identities was more than $6.1 million, about $4.7 million of which Henderson and Babb pocketed.
Henderson was charged with conspiracy to commit healthcare fraud and aggravated identity theft. As part of his sentence, he was also ordered to pay back the more than $4.7 million he stole.
Babb was sentenced to serve 72 months in prison for her role in the scheme earlier this year.