MORRIS COUNTY — Geoffrey S.  Berman, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced today that medical doctor Paul J. Mathieu and physical therapy doctor Hatem Behiry were each found guilty of participating in a $30 million scheme to defraud Medicare and the New York State Medicaid Program.  The defendants were convicted following a six-week jury trial before U.S. District Judge Lorna G. Schofield.

U.S. Attorney Geoffrey S. Berman said:  “These corrupt doctors betrayed their medical training, their professions, and their Medicare and Medicaid billing privileges.  They chose not to heal, but to harm, the taxpaying public – the real victims of this scheme.”

According to the evidence presented during the trial and statements made in related court filings and proceedings:

Between 2007 and 2013, Mathieu fraudulently posed as the owner of three of six medical clinics in Brooklyn (the “Clinics”), which were all in fact owned by co-conspirator Alexksandr Burman.  During that time period, the Clinics fraudulently billed Medicare and Medicaid approximately $30 million for medical services and supplies that were medically unnecessary and/or not provided.  Throughout this time period, Mathieu fraudulently posed as the owner of three of those clinics, in order to satisfy a New York State law requirement that medical clinics must be owned and operated by a medical professional.

For the last three-and-a-half years of the scheme, Mathieu also directly participated in the fraudulent billing practices of the Clinics, by visiting several of the Clinics on a weekly basis, where he would sign stacks of false and fraudulent medical charts, and issue referrals for expensive additional testing, occupational therapy, and physical therapy, including for physical therapy purportedly provided by defendant Behiry. During this time period, Mathieu saw no patients at all, simply falsifying enormous stacks of phony medical records falsely stating that he had seen and treated such patients.

BEHIRY similarly participated in the fraudulent billing practices of the Clinics, by pretending to provide physical therapy to many of those same patients, most of whom were receiving cash kickbacks for coming to the Clinics. In fact, Behiry was engaged in an empty charade designed to create the appearance of physical therapy, while almost no therapy was actually being provided to many patients. To further the fraud, Behiry also prepared and oversaw the preparation of a huge quantity of phony medical and billing records. Among other things, Behiry completed thousands of fabricated reports, in which patients were described almost identically, and with little or no regard for actual medical conditions or needs.  As with Mathieu, many of the charts were for patients whom Behiry and his team had not evaluated or provided therapy to at all.

In addition to his role in the Clinics, Mathieu also wrote unneeded prescriptions for adult diapers and other incontinence products, which were filled at Universal Supply Depot, a medical supply company also owned by Burman’s wife. Mathieu was so prolific in this regard that, throughout the period of the fraud, he was regularly a top prescriber of adult diapers in the State of New York. Mathieu continued to write such prescriptions, even after the Clinics were closed down because Medicare stopped paying any of the clinics’ claims.

Mathieu and Behiry bring to fifteen the number of defendants convicted in this and related cases.  The other defendants include:  Aleksandr Burman, 57, the leader of the scheme, who was sentenced in a related case on May 8, 2017, to 120 months in prison; Marina Burman, 56, the former wife of Aleksandr Burman and the owner of Universal Supply Depot, was sentenced on May 17, 2018, to 36 months in prison; Mustak Y. Vaid, 45, a physician, was sentenced on August 1, 2018, to 18 months in prison; Ewald J. Antoine, 68, a physician, was sentenced on August 21, 2018, to 18 months in prison; Asher Oleg Kataev, 50, a Burman business partner, was sentenced on May 31, 2018, to 36 months in prison; Alla Tsirlin, 49, a Clinic office manager, was sentenced on June 5, 2018, to a year and a day in prison; and Edward Miselevich, 46, and Ivan Voychak, 39, Burman partners who jointly ran a related ambulette company, were sentenced on June 12, 2018, and July 19, 2018, respectively, to 36 months in prison each.  In addition, Lina Zhitnik, 52, and Dina Cabana Rubenstein, 39, occupational therapists, Valery Volsky, 60, a bookkeeper, Olga Kharuk, 47, and Natalya Grabovskaya, 48, office managers, have each also pled guilty for their participation in this scheme and are awaiting sentencing.

Mr. Berman praised the outstanding work of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Office of the Inspector General of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and the New York State Office of the Medicaid Inspector General.

PARSIPPANY — Legislation sponsored by Assemblyman Jay Webber requiring companies to inform users of online security breaches was signed into law.

Webber’s measure (S52/A3245) protects consumers by expanding a list of breaches requiring notification to include more online-oriented, but no less important, information, such as user names, email addresses, and any identifying information that can be used with a password or security question to access an online account. Driver’s license and social security numbers, account numbers, and credit or debit card numbers were already included.

“Digital security breaches can result in financial loss or identity theft for innocent victims just as much as breaches concerning traditional tools of identity theft,” said Webber (R-Morris). “Customers should be informed of any breach that threatens their online accounts as soon as it is discovered to allow them to change passwords and monitor accounts for fraudulent activity. Online customers rightfully expect their personal and financial data to be protected, and this new law will help meet that expectation.”

More than five billion records were exposed by breaches in 2018, according to a report released in February by security intelligence vendor Risk Based Security.

Recently, Marriott announced that more than a half million customer accounts were exposed to hackers. Last year, customer data was compromised at Uber, Facebook, Dunkin’ Donuts, British Airwaves and T-Mobile.

The largest online breach occurred in 2013-2014, when the accounts of three billion Yahoo users were jeopardized.

DENVILLE —Morris County Sheriff James M. Gannon Immediately deployed the highly-trained, tactical Sheriff’s Emergency Response Team (SERT), the K-9 Section and Bomb Unit upon learning the Morris County School of Technology went into lockdown mode at 7:35 a.m. Friday, May 10, based upon what police believed at the time was a credible threat of violence targeting the Denville-based school.

Denville Police at 7:35 a.m. Friday received information reporting that an act of violence was going to occur at the School of Technology, and almost simultaneously, the school itself received similar information from a second source.

As both staff and students were arriving on campus for the school day, an immediate decision to ensure the safety of the students, staff and campus was made and the school was placed on lockdown. Students and faculty on site initiated lockdown procedures by securing themselves in classrooms. All arriving students and faculty were turned away to return to their sending districts, home or to a supervised staging area to await further instructions from the school.

Sheriff Gannon immediately responded to the school on Route 53 and Morris County Sheriff’s Office Undersheriff Mark Spitzer, who oversees the Bureau of Law Enforcement, went to the area designated for parents to gather.

The Morris County Sheriff’s Office SERT team, K-9 and Bomb Unit detectives remained on the premises while a Sheriff’s Officer assisted Denville police in conducting a room by room search  that lasted more than 100 minutes before the premises were deemed to be safe.

As soon as the school was placed in lockdown, an intensive investigation into the initial reports, which originated on the Snapchat social media platform, was conducted with the assistance of the Butler Police Department and the Passaic County Sheriff’s Department.

Authorities determined that a current threat did not exist at the Morris County School of Technology and the search concluded around 9:20 a.m., when the lockdown was lifted. School administrators determined that school would continue for the day but students were free to leave, under parental supervision.

Standing alongside Morris County School of Technology Superintendent Scott Moffitt, Denville Police Captain Jeff Tucker, Principal Lynn Jackson, and School Resource Officer Kristian Sandman, Sheriff Gannon addressed parents and students in the school cafeteria around 10:30 a.m.

“We take these incidents extremely seriously. Our most vulnerable populations are in schools. They’re our students. They’re our grandchildren. They’re our children. They’re professionals, paraprofessionals, teachers, all the people who make it work,” Sheriff Gannon said to the students and parents.

The Sheriff praised the response of the school district and the Denville Police Department to what was treated as a credible threat to the lives of students and faculty at the Morris County School of Technology.

“A threat came in this morning. It was deemed a credible threat by the police department. An unknown actor and the time of it was around 7:35 a.m., which was consistent with students arriving at the school.  There was no other decision to make than the decision that was made.  And everyone stands by that,” Sheriff Gannon said.

Sheriff Gannon, in collaboration with the Morris County Chiefs of Police Association, Morris County school districts, and mental health professionals, in 2018 founded the RSVP-3 program, which stands for Responsible School Violence Prevention, Preparation, Protection.

RSVP-3’s components include tactical training for police departments so they are fully prepared to enter schools in the event of violence and developing a system of assessing threats so that none fall through the cracks. The federal Urban Area Security Initiative (UASI) and the Morris County Board of Freeholders have contributed $75,000 each to the RSVP-3 program.

Also responding to the incident at the school were the Denville Volunteer Fire Department and Rescue Squad, Denville Volunteer Fire Department Rescue Task Force, Denville Township Office of Emergency Management, New Jersey State Police, Parsippany Police Department and the Montville Township Police Department.

DENVILLE — The Morris County School of Technology is lockdown this morning as police investigated a shooting threat.

Parsippany Police issued the following statement:

Morris County Vocational Technical School (Denville Campus) implemented a lockdown this morning. Parsippany students being transported on buses were rerouted to Parsippany Hills High School (PHHS) and are safely there. Those students who are shared time will either remain at PHHS or be transported to Parsippany High School for the remainder of their classes today. Parsippany Police are assisting with security at our district schools.