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Former East Lyme resident Jeffrey Slocum, age 55, pleaded guilty to healthcare fraud and kickback charges on Wednesday, Aug. 16, the US Attorney's Office for the District of Connecticut announced.
According to federal officials, between 2017 and 2022, Slocum, who now lives in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, was a licensed professional counselor with a New London office located at 300 State St.
In 2020, the Connecticut Medicaid program told Slocum that he would be audited for claims for psychotherapy services that he had billed to Medicaid between March 2018 and February 2020.
As part of this audit, the program requested records related to around 100 individual psychotherapy services that Slocum had billed to Medicaid.
The next year, in March 2021, the program told Slocum that the audit had eventually found that he had received more than $225,000 in payments for undocumented services. He was then told that Medicaid would begin collecting this overpayment by deducting funds in installments from future payments.
According to officials, once Slocum learned of the results of the audit, he then began submitting false claims for services that he claimed he personally provided.
Slocum admitted on Wednesday that between March 1, 2020, and Feb. 24, 2022, he submitted a total of $695,048 in false claims to Medicaid.
Additionally, he also admitted to participating in a scheme to pay kickbacks to Medicaid patients in order to convince them to receive psychotherapy services from him. As part of this, he would give patients cash payments, money orders, and Wal-Mart and VISA gift cards, officials said.
When Slocum is sentenced on Wednesday, Nov. 8, he faces up to 20 years in prison.
Anyone who suspects someone of engaging in healthcare fraud can report it by calling 1-800-HHS-TIPS.
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