Billings Woman Has to Pay Back Over $600k for Medicaid Fraud

This year has been a wild year for crime, don't you think? Law enforcement across Montana has been cracking down on crime. It doesn't appear law enforcement is going to let up either as we head toward the end of the year.

The latest major bust involves a Billings woman who pulled off some serious Medicaid fraud.

Billings Woman Gets 3 Years in Prison for Medicaid Fraud

A former licensed professional counselor our of Billings, Staci West is about to spend the next three years at the Montana Women's Prison for Medicaid fraud and making a false claim to a public agency.

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Oh, and she's also going to have to pay $603,719.66 in restitution on top of a 10-year suspended sentence after her three years behind bars. Yeah, that's a lot of hours put into prison work programs and something she'll be dealing with for quite some time.

She'll also be "excluded from billing any federal health insurance program for the length of the sentence."

Billings Woman Commits Medicaid Fraud

According to officials, West billed patients for sessions on Medicaid that she never actually completed. In some cases, she didn't even treat patients at all but billed for sessions anyway.

I have to admit - this is pretty alarming because while she got caught, how many others have gotten away with it?

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Think about how many elderly people take the advice of their provider or who are unknowingly being billed for services and don't know it.

It's a scary but real situation that officials continue to address and we can help.

Officials say you can report suspicious activity or elderly abuse by calling the Medicaid Fraud hotline at Medicaid Fraud hotline at 800-376-1115.