AG ANNOUNCES ARREST OF MOBILE DENTIST FOR MEDICAID FRAUD
(MONTGOMERY)— Attorney General Luther Strange announced the arrest of a Mobile dentist, William Gerard Eastburn, on one count of filing false claims with the Alabama Medicaid Agency and one count of first-degree theft of property.
The Attorney General’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit presented evidence to the May 2015 term of the Montgomery County grand jury, resulting in an indictment* dated May 15 charging Eastburn with Medicaid fraud and theft of property. The allegations stem from a series of procedures that Eastburn either did not perform or performed under false pretenses.
The procedure at issue, an indirect pulp cap, requires certain prerequisites in order to be covered by the Alabama Medicaid Agency. It is alleged that on numerous occasions East burn performed these procedures without the required prerequisites being present and that he fabricated the need for such procedures. It also is alleged that on numerous occasions the procedure was not performed at all, but that the Medicaid Agency still was billed. Medicaid fraud is an unclassified felony with a maximum possible prison sentence of five years. Theft of property in the first degree is a class B felony, which carries a possible prison sentence of two to 20 years imprisonment.
Attorney General Strange commended his Medicaid Fraud Control Unit for its steadfast investigation of this case, as well as the Alabama Medicaid Agency’s Program Integrity Unit, which referred the case for investigation and prosecution.
*An indictment is merely an accusation. The defendant is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.
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