Former ‘outstanding refugee’ charged with Medicaid fraud

(The Center Square) – The state of Minnesota filed criminal charges against two people for $1.5 million in alleged Medicaid Fraud, the state’s attorney general said, including one who was reportedly honored by the state as an “outstanding refugee.

Minnesota charged Salman Ahmed Elmi with eight felony counts, Attorney General Keith Ellison said in a news release.

“From 2024 through 2026, Elmi operated Reva Health in Golden Valley,” Ellison said. “Reva claimed to provide adult rehabilitative mental health services  to Medicaid recipients. In fact, Elmi and other co-conspirators at Reva falsified documentation to obtain Medicaid reimbursement, instructed employees to pay recipients illegal kickbacks in exchange for those recipients’ permission to use their personal information in support of false claims for Medicaid reimbursements, utilized ineligible providers to provide ARMHS to recipients, and falsely claimed to have provided ARMHS with adequate supervision when there was little to no, in fact.”

In 2021I, Elmi was honored by the state of Minnesota as an "outstanding refugee," according to local media reports.

Ellison alleges Elmi and others at the company also created false documents to get Medicaid reimbursements and told employees to pay illegal kickbacks to use personal information to support false claims.

In another case, Mohamed Haji Rashid has been charged with nine felonies for billing for Medicaid services that never provided or were ineligible for Medicaid reimbursement, Ellison said.

Rashid operated Liberty Home Health Care in Minneapolis and Columbia Heights.

“Liberty provided personal care assistant services and home and community based services to Medicaid recipients in the Twin Cities,” Ellison said. “Liberty billed for PCA services that its PCAs did not provide on over 3,300 separate occasions.”

In one instance, according to Ellison, Rashid told a PCA to report more hours than she worked.

The Minnesota Sentencing Guidelines Commission recently approved a higher classification for a new Medicaid fraud offense created under a recently passed law, moving theft of more than $1 million from Severity Level 7 to Severity Level 8.

"Medicaid fraud steals money meant to provide healthcare to our low-income friends and neighbors,” Ellison said. “It is illegal, and it makes my blood boil, which is why I’m filing these charges and why I’ve built a strong record of holding fraudsters accountable. My team and I have won over 340 Medicaid fraud convictions so far, which is an average of one fraud conviction every eight days since I’ve been your Attorney General.”

This story originally appeared on thecentersquare.com.