Healthcare fraud conviction, and charges

  A federal jury in Fort Lauderdale found Yvonne May Richards, 59, of Tamarac, guilty of 10 counts in connection with a scheme to defraud Medicare, the U.S. attorney's office announced.

In another case, federal prosecutors charged a physician, Orestes Avlarez-Jacinto, with conspiracy to commit healthcare fraud for submitting $7 million of fraudulent claims over a five-month period for expensive treatments for HIV patients who went to the St. Jude Rehab Center, which was located at 330 SW 27th Ave. in Miami.

Medicare paid about $5 million for the St. Jude claims. The doctor was allegedly paid $90,000 by the clinic for his efforts. The case is being prosecuted by Hank Bond Walther.

In the Richards conviction, she and several defendants were charged with executing a six-year scheme to defraud Medicare in their operation of a psychiatric partial hospitalization program at the now defunct Oakland Community Health Center in Oakland Park.

Several other defendants have already pleaded guilty in that case, which was prosecuted by Robert N. Nicholson and Roger H. Stefin.

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