Feds indict Texarkana foot doc Gregg Petty for fraud, identity theft

Photo via drpettysfootclinic.com
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Texarkana podiatrist Gregg Petty was indicted Wednesday for 22 counts of health care fraud and nine counts of identity theft by a federal grand jury.

Petty, 52, owns Community Foot Clinic, formerly Dr. Petty’s Foot Clinic, on Summerhill Road in Texarkana, Texas, as well as Legacy Foot and Ankle in Frisco, Texas, according to the clinics’ websites. A 31-count indictment issued Wednesday in the Texarkana division of the Eastern District of Texas accuses Petty of stealing more than $150,000 from U.S. taxpayers from September 2010 to January 2013 through fraudulent Medicare billing.

The indictment’s first 13 counts accuse Petty of billing Medicare for office visits and treatments using Health Insurance Claim Numbers of people who were dead at the time he allegedly saw them in Dr. Petty’s Foot Clinic. Some of the patients had been deceased for more than a year and some just a week or two when Petty allegedly submitted claims for services rendered following their dates of death.

Four counts accuse Petty of billing Medicare for physical therapy when in reality all the patients received were written or verbal instructions on how to exercise at home. Five counts allege Petty billed Medicare for “electronic stimulation treatments” that were performed with a non-approved device called a MicroVas. Those counts further allege the MicroVas treatments were administered by clinic staff and Petty’s teenage son who were not qualified to deliver services reimbursable by Medicare. The indictment’s last nine counts accuse Petty of aggravated identity theft on multiple dates in 2011 and 2012.

A notice of forfeiture in Petty’s indictment spells out the government’s intent to acquire a $157,660 judgment against Dr. Petty.

Each of the 22 counts of health care fraud is punishable by up to 10 years in federal prison, a fine of up to $250,000, or both. Each of the nine counts of identity theft carries a mandatory two-year federal prison sentence which “is to run consecutively to any other sentence imposed. A person convicted of a violation of this section shall not be placed on probation,” the indictment states.

Petty is set for an arraignment hearing June 29 before a federal judge in Texarkana.

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