MARYLAND NEWS

Source: US Attorney, Eastern District of Louisiana

A federal grand jury has returned an indictment charging a 50- year-old Glen Burnie man, a 40-year old Westminster man and a 39 year old Cleveland man with conspiracy to commit wire fraud in connection with a technical support scheme where victims were made to believe that their computers had been compromised by a virus, or were susceptible to hacking, and payments were needed for computer repair services or software. Source: US Attorney, District of Maryland

The Gift Card Scam Prevention Act of 2024, requires

1. gift cards sold in stores be encased in secure packages to prevent fraudsters from obtaining their numbers; 

2.  those who  sell gift cards online must register them with the Office of the Attorney General's Division of Consumer Protection,  and

3. sellers also must train employees on how to detect gift card fraud. 

Source: CBS News via msn.com and Maryland General Assembly SB 0760

Gold bar fraud has hit once again, defrauding a Bethesda 74-year-old man with memory loss out of $1.1 million. Fraudsters told him to convert his money to gold bars and give them to the fraudsters for safekeeping, according to court records. Source: Washington Post via msn.com

 

The United States alleged that Patrick Britton-Harr owned and operated Provista Health, LLC as well as multiple other corporate entities that sought to profit from the unfolding COVID-19 pandemic by offering COVID-19 tests to nursing homes as a way to bill Medicare for a wide array of medically unnecessary respiratory pathogen panel (RPP) tests. The complaint alleged that these RPP tests were not medically necessary because the beneficiaries had no symptoms of a respiratory illness and because the tests were for uncommon respiratory pathogens.

Despite a court order prohibiting Britton-Harr from selling his house in Annapolis without approval from the court, he sold the house on September 23, 2023, for $575,000 and dissipated the financial proceeds from the sale. On March 4, 2024, the court granted the United States’ motion to hold Britton-Harr in civil contempt for violating this order and ordered him to deposit $575,000 with the court’s registry.

On July 18th, the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland entered default judgments for the United States totaling $26,341,951.38 against Patrick Britton-Harr and multiple laboratory companies owned by him for violations of the False Claims Act.  The court entered these judgments after Britton-Harr and his companies failed to defend against the United States’ allegations.

Source: US Attorney, District of Maryland

A federal judge sentenced two people in Rockville for filing fraudulent Unemployment Insurance claims. The convictions stem from at least 38 fraudulent unemployment claims filed in 2020 in the names of identity theft victims, causing the Maryland Department of Labor to distribute more than $500,000 in benefits on bank debit cards with the defendants' own physical address on the claims.

Source: Maryland Attorney General

Victims Of the Fraud Scheme Included the Worcester County Treasurer’s Office and Numerous Individuals Worldwide

Source: US Attorney, District of Maryland

The University of Maryland, College Park (UMD) has agreed to pay $500,000 to resolve allegations that it violated the False Claims Act by failing to disclose current and pending support from foreign sources for faculty members who were principal investigators (PI) or co-PIs of federal research grant proposals.

The settlement relates to research grant support UMD received from the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Department of the Army between 2015 and 2020. These agencies require grant applicants to disclose all current and pending support received by the institution, its PIs, and co-PIs.  Current and pending support is defined as all resources from whatever source — including foreign government sources — that are made available to researchers in support of and/or related to their research endeavors. The agencies rely on the accuracy of these disclosures, in part, to avoid funding duplicative research projects and to ensure their highly competitive grants are awarded only to PIs who demonstrate they have the time and ability to perform the planned work. Non-disclosure of required information can result in missed opportunities for other applicants to receive funding for their own research.

Source: US Attorney, District of Maryland

On July 3 the Maryland Board of Public Works approved a contract for almost $20 million to upgrade Maryland’s EBT (electronic benefits transfer)  system, which delivers benefits to Marylanders eligible for the Temporary Cash Assistance Program, the Temporary Disability Assistance Program and SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program).Source Baltimore Sun via msn.com

 

Source: WMAR2news.com and Maryland Attorney General’s Office