United States v. Juanetta Martin

555 F. App'x 358
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
DecidedFebruary 6, 2014
Docket12-31275
StatusUnpublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 555 F. App'x 358 (United States v. Juanetta Martin) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Juanetta Martin, 555 F. App'x 358 (5th Cir. 2014).

Opinion

PER CURIAM: *

Juanetta T. Martin challenges the sufficiency of the evidence supporting her conviction on two counts of committing health care fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1347. She also challenges the district court’s loss calculation and restitution award. Mor-rique Turner, Sr., challenges the sufficiency of the evidence for his conviction of conspiracy to commit health care fraud and mail fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 371, 1347, and 1341. For the following reasons, we AFFIRM the defendants’ convictions and Martin’s sentence.

I. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

A. Factual Background

1. Medicaid

Juanetta T. Martin, a licensed practical nurse (“LPN”), worked full-time at More-house General Hospital (“Morehouse General”) in Bastrop, Louisiana. Martin also owned and operated a home health care business, Bayou Home Bureau, Inc. (“Bay *360 ou”). Bayou was incorporated in 1999 to provide residential personal care to elderly and invalid patients. Morrique Turner, Sr., Martin’s son, was a Bayou employee who provided homecare services.

From 1999 until 2009, Bayou acted as a Medicaid provider, eventually providing home sitting and nursing care for between fifty and sixty Medicaid patients. 1 As a Medicaid provider, Bayou submitted claims for payment to Medicaid based on fifteen-minute “units” of care. Bayou also was required to maintain the last five years’ worth of timesheets and nurse notes including the caretaker’s name, as well as a description of the type of care provided.

Abigail Emery, Turner’s ex-wife and Martin’s former daughter-in-law, was responsible for submitting claims on behalf of Bayou to Medicaid. Emery was trained by Henry Cotton, a consultant and Martin’s friend. Cotton instructed Emery to bill the maximum allowable number of units approved by Medicaid each week. Emery eventually became concerned about Bayou’s billing practices when Medicaid audited Bayou. As part of the audit, Medicaid asked to see Bayou’s timesheets and nurse notes.

After reading Medicaid’s manuals and learning that billing was to be done based on timesheets and nurse notes, Emery brought her concerns about Bayou’s maximum billing practices to Martin and Cotton. Despite Emery’s warning, Martin and Cotton did not instruct her to change how she submitted claims to Medicaid. In particular, Emery continued receiving timesheets from Bayou’s employees twice per month, making it impossible for her to submit accurate information to Medicaid, which required weekly billing. 2

Furthermore, the billing information Emery received, and which was submitted to Medicaid, did not accurately reflect the care patients were provided. Some Bayou employees would not complete their own timesheets and nurse notes. Turner, for example, paid someone in the office to prepare the nurse notes for him. Sitters also would report caring for patients even when those patients were hospitalized and could not receive the stated care. In one example, Bayou billed Medicaid for care Turner purportedly provided to a patient on September 20, 28, and 25, 2005, despite that patient being hospitalized from September 16 to September 26, 2005. In another example, Lizzie Smith, Martin’s coworker at Morehouse General and a Bayou employee, turned in timesheets and nurse notes stating that she cared for a child patient. In reality, the child was being cared for by her family. Smith asked Martin if this was allowed. Although Martin initially said no because doing so would mean engaging in fraud, Martin several weeks later brought Smith the necessary paperwork to fill out. Martin told Smith that billing Medicaid was “okay” provided that someone was watching the patient.

Partly as a result of these practices, Medicaid repeatedly audited Bayou. In response to each audit, Emery and other Bayou employees would gather the necessary records, including timesheets and nurse notes. If a record did not exist, Martin and Cotton instructed Bayou’s employees to create it. Although, after the *361 first audit, Medicaid provided Bayou with an “education letter” advising Bayou how to avoid overlapping care issues, Bayou did not change its billing practices. In all, Medicaid sanctioned Bayou eight times for a total of approximately $68,000 for repeatedly billing for services allegedly rendered when a patient was hospitalized.

As a result of Bayou’s continuing problems, the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit of the Louisiana Attorney General’s Office initiated a criminal investigation. As part of the investigation, certain of Bayou’s timesheets and nurse notes were subpoenaed. Bayou produced only some of the required documents. A search warrant executed on Bayou’s office revealed a “very unorganized” state of affairs with “documents strewn about.” After a criminal indictment was filed, Martin gave three employees, including Smith and Turner, each a form entitled “Affidavit of No Plea Agreement,” in which the employee agreed to produce an affidavit stating that he did not wish to take any sort of plea agreement that was offered. Martin had Smith sign and notarize the document.

2. Blue Cross/Blue Shield

In addition to operating Bayou and working at Morehouse General, Martin, in her individual capacity, enrolled as an LPN provider with Blue Cross/Blue Shield (“Blue Cross”). 3 In that role, she cared for two Blue Cross-insured patients, C.S. and E.D. Billing to Blue Cross was based on current procedural technology (“CPT”) codes. CPT codes were developed by the American Medical Association, and consist of five-digit codes that represent a specific service provided by the biller. Each claim included information about the patient, the insured, and the services provided.

Although initially billing Blue Cross between $450 and $500 per day of care for each of her two patients, Martin, in less than a year, began submitting daily care charges for as much as $800, and for as much as $1,600 a short time later. Martin’s submission of claims exceeding $800,000 “in a very short period of time” led Blue Cross to commence an investigation. As part of this investigation, Blue Cross asked Martin for the patients’ records. Martin proved “not very cooperative,” and Blue Cross had to make repeated efforts to get Martin to produce the requested documents. Blue Cross was also contacted by a woman identifying herself as Susan Turner, who stated that she would be Martin’s point-of-contact. Susan Turner was “very aggressive” and challenged Blue Cross’s authority to access the records. Blue Cross eventually warned Martin that if the records were not provided, it would seek to recoup the over $800,000 Blue Cross had paid her.

Martin supplied the records Blue Cross demanded in December 2008.

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555 F. App'x 358, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-juanetta-martin-ca5-2014.