Niranjan Mittal, a cardiologist based out of Brooklyn, New York, has been arrested due to his alleged participation in a fraud scheme that involved fabricating patient records, making illegal referrals and billing the U.S. government for medically unnecessary interventional cardiology procedures.
In total, Mittal is charged with one count of conspiracy to commit healthcare fraud and wire fraud, one count of healthcare fraud, one count of conspiracy to violate the Anti-Kickback Statute and one count of violating the Anti-Kickback Statute. Combined, these counts carry a maximum sentence of 45 years in prison.
According to the indictment, Mittal operated a Brooklyn clinic that treated “a patient base consisting of many individuals of limited economic means who were insured by government healthcare programs.” While running this clinic, Mittal would allegedly send payments to other healthcare providers that were said to be leases for additional office space—but they were actually payments for these other providers to refer their patients to Mittal’s own clinic. Mittal would then allegedly convince the patients they required medically unnecessary treatments, billing Medicare, Medicaid or private insurance providers for the procedures in addition to changing patient records so that it appeared the treatments were necessary.