FBI Uncovers Largest Healthcare Fraud in US History

The FBI and Department of Justice (DOJ) on June 30 said that almost $15 billion was reported in losses in the “largest health care fraud” investigation in U.S. history, with officials charging more than 300 people in connection with the alleged scheme.

In a post on social media platform X, FBI Director Kash Patel wrote that $14.6 billion in losses were incurred, while $245 million was seized, as FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino said in a separate post on X that hundreds of people were charged in the case.

“Public corruption will not be tolerated as the Director and I vigorously pursue bad actors who violated their oaths to all of us,” Bongino said, describing the case as the “largest healthcare fraud investigation” in the country’s history.

The investigation encompassed 50 federal districts and 12 state attorneys general, according to the DOJ. State and federal law enforcement agencies also took part, according to the FBI.

A statement issued by the DOJ said that criminal charges were filed against 324 defendants, including 96 doctors, nurse practitioners, pharmacists, and other health care workers across the United States. Officials said that 29 defendants were charged with partaking in transnational criminal groups who allegedly submitted around $12 billion in fraudulent health-related claims to U.S. health insurance companies.

Further, four defendants were apprehended in Estonia based on cooperation with law enforcement agencies in that country, while seven others were arrested at the U.S.–Mexico border or at American airports, the DOJ said.

That organization, federal prosecutors said, is accused of using individuals sent into the United States from other countries to purchase “dozens of medical supply companies located across the United States” before submitting $10.6 billion in fraudulent health care claims to Medicare for medical devices and equipment.

At the same time, that group allegedly exploited stolen identities from U.S. citizens across all 50 states, using their stolen medical information to submit the false claims, according to the DOJ.

In another action announced by the DOJ, federal officials said they filed charges in Illinois against five people, including the owners of two Pakistan-based marketing companies, in relation to a $703 million Medicare fraud scheme.

The defendants allegedly stole Medicare beneficiaries’ confidential information and sold it to laboratories and other medical companies, which then submitted false Medicare claims, according to the statement.

“The defendants allegedly used artificial intelligence to create fake recordings of Medicare beneficiaries purportedly consenting to receive certain products,” the DOJ’s statement said.

The results of the operation on June 30 come as federal prosecutors and the FBI have increasingly targeted health care fraud and related schemes.

In 2024, officials with the DOJ charged 193 people, including 76 doctors, nurses, and other medical professionals, with participating in health care fraud schemes worth $2.75 billion.

In that case, the defendants were accused of illegally distributing millions of pills of the stimulant Adderall and of conducting fraudulent schemes involving $176 million of drug and alcohol abuse treatment services. One defendant allegedly billed the federal Medicaid program for treatment that was either inadequate or nonexistent, prosecutors said at the time.

And in 2023, the DOJ announced federal criminal charges targeting 78 defendants across 16 states as part of a law enforcement action involving $2.5 billion in alleged health care fraud schemes targeting elderly and disabled people, HIV patients, and pregnant women.