Doctor’s Orders | 5. Ashes to Ashes

Not even indictments, criminal charges, and guilty pleas are enough to shut down this massive criminal operation, which seems to morph and evolve quicker than prosecutors can catch on. Doctor’s Orders is produced by Western Sound for Sony Music Entertainment’s The Binge. Binge all episodes of Doctor’s Orders, ad-free today by subscribing to The Binge. Visit The Binge Crimes on Apple Podcasts and hit ‘subscribe’ or visit GetTheBinge.com to get access. The Binge – feed your true crime obsession Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Hey Spotify listeners. When you travel with American Airlines, you'll enjoy comfort and convenience at every altitude. Before takeoff, unwind in the Admirals Club Lounge with curated self-serve offerings of hearty bites and refreshments. In flight, stay connected with high-speed Wi-Fi, sponsored by AT&T. Your journey is designed to feel easy from the moment you check in to the moment you arrive. No matter where you're going, American gets you there. Book now at aa.com.

• 0:27Speaker 01

  Say hello to smooth, sugar-like sweetness with Truvia Alulose Plus Stevia Sweetener and Monk Fruit Sweetener. This blend delivers balanced sweetness that minimizes aftertaste with zero calories per serving. Designed to fit everyday moments, Truvia Alulose Blend measures cup for cup like sugar, making it effortless to swap into beverages, baking, and even savory dishes. Find Truvia Alulose Plus Stevia Sweetener and Monk Fruit Sweetener online and nationwide at Kroger, Target, and your favorite local grocery retailer.

• 0:57Speaker 02

  Listen to all episodes of Doctor's Orders ad-free right now by subscribing to The Binge. Visit The Binge channel on Apple Podcasts and hit Subscribe at the top of the page, or visit getthebinge.com to get access wherever you listen. The Binge: Feed Your True Crime Obsession.

• 1:27Speaker 03

  How much is the pain in your left shoulder? On a scale of 0 to 10?

• 1:33Speaker 04

  Sometimes like all the way to like an 8.

• 1:36Speaker 03

  8?

• 1:36Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 1:37Speaker 02

  This is an undercover agent visiting a frontline medical office. It was recorded in March 2013, so just before Kelly Sue Park was tried for Juliana Redding's murder.

• 1:48Speaker 03

  Any other problem?

• 1:51Speaker 04

  No, that's it.

• 1:53Speaker 03

  That's it?

• 1:54Speaker 02

  The agent, or patient, says his shoulder hurts. A lot. The doctor is sitting at a desk across the room. He gets up, walks over, examines the shoulder for a solid 20 seconds.

• 2:06Speaker 03

  Does it hurt like that?

• 2:09Speaker 04

  A little bit, but it's mostly like...

• 2:12Speaker 03

  Mostly here?

• 2:13Speaker 04

  Inside, yeah.

• 2:14Speaker 03

  Do it like that?

• 2:15Speaker 02

  And I want you to think for a moment about trust. When the agent walked in for his appointment, he thought he was meeting with a Dr. Johnson. When he asked the doctor's name,

• 2:26Speaker 04

  Are you Dr. Johnson?

• 2:28Speaker 02

  He says back,

• 2:28Speaker 03

  I am Dr. Gubram, for Dr. Johnson.

• 2:31Speaker 04

  Oh, okay.

• 2:32Speaker 02

  How do we know this man is a doctor? Okay, he's wearing a long white coat and a tie. He's older, maybe in his 60s. He has white hair. He works in a medical office. And all the people in this medical office, let's just assume, they've all indicated that this man is a doctor. So any normal person would trust he's a doctor. I would.

• 2:54Speaker 03

  Okay. I'm going to order MRI of Len Shorner.

• 3:00Speaker 02

  But what if he's not? What if you've fallen into a medical bizarro world, where all the rules are upside down? Would you even know? Could you even know? This appointment lasts less than three minutes. The doctor, well, let's just say the man in the white coat, orders an MRI, some medicine for the patient, and then sends him on his way.

• 3:23Speaker 03

  You can go now.

• 3:24Speaker 04

  Okay, that's it?

• 3:25Speaker 03

  That's it.

• 3:26Speaker 04

  Okay, thank you.

• 3:28Speaker 03

  Left shoulder.

• 3:35Speaker 02

  In 2015, when the Los Angeles County District Attorney unsealed two indictments, they included 132 felony counts against 15 named defendants. The most serious charges are 18 counts of aggravated mayhem against those who conspired to deceive patients into having surgeries performed by a man who is not a doctor. Manir Ueda and 11 others faced up to life in prison.

• 4:08Speaker 02

  I'm Ben Adair. From Sony Music Entertainment and Western Sound, you're listening to Doctor's Orders.

• 4:19Speaker 02

  This is episode five, Ashes to Ashes.

• 4:25Speaker 02

  By the time Santa Monica homicide detectives raided a storage space and discovered a trove of documents, over 100 boxes, they said, Munir Yueda's medical empire had grown and grown. Investigative auditors will eventually dig into 115 different bank accounts, both business and personal accounts, that they believe might be related to the fraud. Total funds deposited into these accounts between January 2003 and October 2014 were over $272 million. They found millions in international transfers, a lot to Estonia, a lot to Lebanon, and

• 5:09Speaker 02

  they found that the international transfers increased after 2010, which, coincidentally or not, was the year that Munir Yueda left the United States. Eventually, forensic auditors focused on 24 bank accounts and a few personal ones relating to those indicted, including one for Kelly Sue Park. They analyzed the flow of money between these accounts and found, over a four-year period, almost $185 million moving through them. Though Munir was not a signer on any of these accounts, prosecutors believe he was the common denominator, controlling what went in and what went out.

• 5:51Speaker 02

  So, of that $185 million, how much of that was legit business? How much of that was fraud? What was the balance of unneeded, unnecessary, destructive care versus legitimate, helpful, healing care? This is what prosecutors had to figure out. In 2010, the LADA's office created a special task force to try to see what was going on. In 2012, this guy.

• 6:23Speaker 05

  My name is Dayan Mathai.

• 6:24Speaker 02

  Career prosecutor Dayan Mathai joined it.

• 6:28Speaker 05

  And what we discovered was not only healthcare fraud, but there was fraud happening in multiple areas that went beyond just simple billing fraud. It was much more massive. It involved lawyers, doctors, physician's assistants, real estate agents. It was widespread and touched on different areas.

• 6:52Speaker 02

  Investigators began to uncover what they say was a very sophisticated operation, and a sprawling one, all designed to do one thing: move patients through as much care as possible and bill, bill, bill, bill, bill. With little or no regard, they say, to the patients themselves and what happened to them. Take someone like Jenny Malone, who we heard from a couple of episodes ago.

• 7:17Speaker 06

  I was at a trade show for work and I fell down. And I needed to let my boss know that I wasn't going to go into work on the following Monday. So I just wanted to go get it checked to make sure that everything was still okay.

• 7:32Speaker 02

  Remember Jenny chose a frontline medical office because it was convenient. She went in and suddenly wham, all these things started happening.

• 7:40Speaker 06

  The doctors there, after they did all of these x-rays and then the MRIs, they told me that I'm going to need surgery. And I was like, oh my God, what, you know, why?

• 7:51Speaker 02

  So Jenny, who's coming in just to get something checked out, she might have been like, I don't know, a few thousand in billing. Suddenly, she's over a million. I want to play a little bit more of her story, as messed up as it is. And as you listen, I want you to imagine it from a billing point of view, where every interaction, every intervention is a billable opportunity.

• 8:17Speaker 02

  So after gauze was left in her arm during surgery.

• 8:19Speaker 06

  I think I waited for a full week before I went back in, even though I was in pain, but I figured that's normal. I just had surgery. Then the pain just kept progressing and getting really, really bad. And I went back in probably like two or three days after my follow-up. From that point on, I was going to the medical clinic at least twice a week. It just hurt so bad, I can't even describe it. And I was like popping pills. I should take two every four to six hours, but then I'm taking more and more, and nothing would make the pain go away. I knew that something wasn't right because I had a fever. And go in, they would give me a shot, and then I'd be better for a day or two. And then all of a sudden, it would start up again.

• 9:03Speaker 06

  So then my father-in-law, he was like, oh, your fever's back. We're gonna go back there. We gotta go back. They just kept giving me a shot and telling me that it's okay for me to take more pain pills. And they gave me bottles of pain pills there, even though I had bottles that were already sent to my house. And I mean, I would get two great big bottles of Vicodin at a time. And then when I was there, they gave me a bottle of Vicodin. They did that for many weeks before they looked into giving me an X-ray.

• 9:31Speaker 02

  This 1,000% inverts what health care is supposed to be. Just think about it. If your goal is money, you want to be continually giving people more care. And you know who doesn't need more care? People who get better. Patients who get well are money left on the table. On the other hand, bad outcomes are rewarded with cash.

• 9:57Speaker 02

  Prosecutors digging into Frontline and Munir's associated companies say they quickly found he's got it on lock. He's making money from all around that health care wheel of fortune.

• 10:08Speaker 05

  Once you get that referral to the medical clinic.

• 10:12Speaker 02

  Prosecutor Dan Mathi.

• 10:13Speaker 05

  The patient would go see a doctor. And the doctor would say, okay, I'm gonna give you two medications for your pain. You don't have to go to the pharmacy. It's going to be shipped to you. You're also going to get an MRI. Do you need translation services? Do you need transportation services? Do you have problems sleeping? Do you have problems with your nerves? I'm going to refer you to all these specialists. So the patient's thinking, that's great. I'm going to get all this medical attention. What the patient didn't know is that the same person that owned the medical clinic, Ueda, also owned or controlled all of these other healthcare providers.

• 10:52Speaker 02

  We've heard this before. Let's hear it again.

• 10:55Speaker 05

  The patient was basically like an ATM machine.

• 10:57Speaker 02

  And because workers' comp medicine is completely paid by employers and their insurance companies, the patients had no clue what was going on.

• 11:07Speaker 05

  The patient never gets an explanation of what's built. So it's just between the doctor and insurance company. So the patient's in the dark about what they get built.

• 11:19Speaker 02

  There's a lot more. The fraud, prosecutors say, just kept going and going. They say they found falsified patient records with forged signatures, prescriptions nobody asked for, doctors masquerading as other doctors. Or were they even doctors at all? Who knows? One frontline employee would later testify in open court that if she ever saw a negative MRI, which negative means nothing wrong, she was told to correct it and help get more unnecessary surgeries on the books. Another frontline employee testified to getting financial bonuses for falsifying documents to, again, get more authorizations for more unnecessary surgeries.

• 12:04Speaker 02

  Do we know how many of those unnecessary surgeries were botched? We do not. Prosecutors even allege that Munir paid some patients to convince them to get surgery. And there's a whole other kickback side to it, where non-medical people in the workers' comp system would get paid to refer patients into the frontline web of companies.

• 12:27Speaker 02

  Prosecutors say they discovered companies run by Munir's friends and acquaintances that they say he controlled completely.

• 12:34Speaker 05

  Shelley Rose Kelly, she was a schoolteacher. He brought her in and next thing she knows, she's running a surgical center. Marissa Schirnbeck Nelson, basically she was his secretary. He put her in charge of Golden State pharmacies. And she testified in open court about all this, that, you know, she basically was running a pharmacy, but she had no idea about running pharmacy. Ueda told her what to do and what to say. And like that, he was able to run pharmacies, sleep study centers, MRI centers. And they were all in other people's names. He would spend all his time on the phone every day, basically telling all these people how to run their individual companies.

• 13:13Speaker 02

  We reached out to both Marissa Nelson and Shelley Rose Kelly, but they did not want to comment.

• 13:19Speaker 05

  He was running, had a real estate empire. He had racing cars. He had dogs. He had horses. He was running all these things. How does one person do all that? Well, the testimony that came out was that people like Marissa, his assistants, they would get a list of things to do every morning. And they would follow his instructions. And then they would spend hours on the phone with him all day long. He would hold their hand, tell them what to do.

• 13:51Speaker 02

  Why would he do it? What on earth would possess one man to do something so extreme, spend all his time doing it? When prosecutors finally put a number to the size of the fraud, it's gigantic. $150 million. And, you know, it's easy, in the audacity of this alleged empire of fraud, to forget all the people whose lives were upended or destroyed in its wake. Just like Jenny Malone and Kim Pope from episode three, so many of the victims that prosecutors found had unnecessary and multiple surgeries and were permanently damaged.

• 14:36Speaker 02

  One victim named Mario Dominguez had three knee surgeries before a frontline told him that they had to replace his knee. Mario did get his knee replaced, but he told prosecutors that even years later, he was still experiencing pain and swelling and was left with an eight-inch scar. An expert doctor reviewed his case and found that Mario never needed surgery in the first place. His story is just one of many.

• 15:12Speaker 00

  Hey Spotify listeners. When you travel with American Airlines, you'll enjoy comfort and convenience at every altitude. Before takeoff, unwind in the Admirals Club Lounge with curated self-serve offerings of hearty bites and refreshments. In flight, stay connected with high-speed Wi-Fi. Sponsored by AT&T. Your journey is designed to feel easy from the moment you check in to the moment you arrive. No matter where you're going, American gets you there. Book now at aa.com.

• 15:38Speaker 01

  With Truvia Sweeteners, it's simple to make sweetness part of your routine. From sweetening your creamy morning matcha to freshly baked blueberry scones, Truvia Sweeteners make it easy to enjoy the flavors you love with less sugar per serving. From everyday drinks to homemade favorites, they're made to fit right in. Because with Truvia, every moment tastes better. Find Truvia at your favorite local grocery retailer and bring better sweetness home.

• 16:07Speaker 02

  The grand jury indictments came down in February 2015, and until September, they remained secret. During this time, the L.A. District Attorney's Office was getting ready. Identifying bank accounts and other assets, locating their suspects, getting Munir's international warrant filed. So then, they could pounce, arrest people, freeze assets, shut the fraud down. But it didn't quite work like that.

• 16:37Speaker 07

  When Frontline collapsed, there were hundreds of millions of dollars in the receiving. It's been collecting. Granted, we had to use a lot to jumpstart the new business. What new business is that? The same thing.

• 16:54Speaker 02

  This is an undercover agent speaking with Paul Turley, Munir's main business partner at the time. Turley is explaining to the agent that as the heat was coming down on Frontline, they were already moving assets into a new business.

• 17:08Speaker 07

  So he's running it from doing whatever he's doing from Lebanon, and U.A. is still involved with that as an owner of it?

• 17:17Speaker 07

  Well, we're both involved. It's a silent. Anyway, out of the ashes, I rebuilt a bit. How did you do that? I just did.

• 17:30Speaker 07

  If there's a will, there's a way, huh? But I'm still getting caught. By who? By you, wait.

• 17:40Speaker 02

  On September 14th, 2015, law enforcement fanned out across Southern California. They arrested nine people, including Paul Hurley and Kelly Sue Park. On September 15th, the Los Angeles County District Attorney issued a press release, quote, "15 indicted in $150 million insurance fraud and patient scam conspiracy." Munir was called "the mastermind of fraud."

• 18:07Speaker 05

  He was charged with conspiracy to commit insurance fraud, billing fraud crimes, capping, which is illegal patient referrals, money laundering, and he was charged with aggravated mayhem.

• 18:20Speaker 02

  The press release also said that Munir had been arrested in Germany and was awaiting extradition. But he wasn't. Like so many times before, he mysteriously escaped, and his real whereabouts were unknown.

• 18:39Speaker 02

  Big cases like this are not easy. Even though the charges were announced in 2015, the litigation had begun years earlier.

• 18:47Speaker 05

  The litigation started almost immediately in 2010, 2011.

• 18:53Speaker 02

  The original warrant that found the boxes that kicked off the fraud investigation was part of the Juliana Redding murder investigation. Suddenly, all these very expensive lawyers were showing up, arguing in court.

• 19:06Speaker 05

  So every little step that we tried to take, the lawyers would successfully get it bogged down in litigation.

• 19:14Speaker 02

  After the indictments, there were teams of lawyers, supporting each of the named defendants. Prosecutors say Munir, out of reach in Lebanon, was the mastermind of that, too.

• 19:24Speaker 05

  Now, the lawyers were saying, "I represent this person, I represent that person." But we eventually argued to the court that all, or almost all of them, were being paid by Ueda.

• 19:35Speaker 02

  Despite the grand jury indictments, the initial judge was skeptical of the charges, especially the aggravated mayhem charge, the one that brought the possibility of life in prison for all those charged in the conspiracy.

• 19:47Speaker 05

  And that was one of the first things that got challenged.

• 19:50Speaker 02

  It sounds like something out of a Batman movie. What it means is someone who shows, quote, "extreme indifference to the physical or psychological well-being of another person intentionally causes permanent disability or disfigurement of another human being." Prosecutors argued that the botched surgeries were aggravated mayhem. And the rulings, like in all trials, went back and forth. But to outsiders, it sure looked like the defense was winning. Many of the initial charges, including those aggravated mayhem charges, were dropped by the judge. Not enough evidence. So the DA's then refiled with a different judge.

• 20:30Speaker 03

  The interesting thing about Ueda was, Ueda was not prosecuted by the anti-fraud people in LA.

• 20:36Speaker 02

  This is Jim Fisher, an attorney who specializes in workers' comp fraud, formerly with the California Department of Industrial Relations.

• 20:44Speaker 03

  He was prosecuted by organized crime. I always thought it was peculiar.

• 20:50Speaker 06

  I spoke to one of the prosecutors.

• 20:55Speaker 02

  This is Lance Lamont from AdjusterCom.net. Lance not only followed and reported on the entirety of the Juliana Redding murder trial, but she also followed these new fraud charges.

• 21:05Speaker 06

  We were sitting outside the courtroom one day, and we were sitting on the bench, and I just started talking to her. And, very nice woman. And she just said to me, "Lance, we're from the gang unit. We worked on gang cases. They had no experience with this kind of white-collar crime. And so, they were making mistakes."

• 21:35Speaker 02

  Prosecutor Diane Mathi says, "No, it was the right team. If anything, they were just outgunned."

• 21:41Speaker 05

  There was high-powered lawyers on the defense side. There were four or five lawyers just representing Paul Turley.

• 21:49Speaker 02

  Munir's main business partner at the time.

• 21:51Speaker 05

  So that was bigger than our whole prosecution team, right there. And then you multiply that by each of these defendants had either small law firms or one or two lawyers representing them.

• 22:02Speaker 02

  And after, literally, years of legal back and forth, there were some results.

• 22:08Speaker 06

  A lot of plea deals. Happened. I'd say several, not a whole lot, but several.

• 22:14Speaker 02

  Of the 15 indicted, two were on the lam, Munir and one of his assistants. One of the indicted was released. Dr. David Johnson, who I've mentioned, had advanced terminal cancer. He's since passed away. Eight pleaded guilty, most in return for testimony explaining exactly how the fraud worked, their own roles, and the roles of others. Many of those pleas did involve jail time.

• 22:41Speaker 06

  Paul Turley went to jail for 25 months. He was Ueda's partner, Marissa Schirmbeck Nelson. She was a main player for Dr. Ueda, was like a right-hand woman for some years. She took a plea deal. And Terry Luke, who was his accountant, he took a plea deal.

• 23:06Speaker 02

  Paul Turley eventually pleaded out. He is still awaiting final sentencing. Peter Nelson, the physician assistant who prosecutors alleged did all those botched surgeries, he took a plea deal too. He served two years of jail time. Four defendants, including Kelly Sue Park, got off much easier.

• 23:27Speaker 06

  Okay, here was the huge debacle that was terrible. Kelly Sue Park, Ronnie Case, and Tatiana Torres Arnold. Tatiana Torres Arnold was one of Ueda's lawyers. Those three got let go. They got their cases dismissed because the district attorney missed the deadline for their preliminary hearing. It was prosecutorial incompetence.

• 24:01Speaker 02

  Not quite, says Diane Mathi. There was intense wrangling over a longstanding precedent that allowed prosecutors to group the defendants together for pre-trial litigation. But very expensive lawyers argued to an appeals court that that tradition should not stand. And they won. The court dismissed the charges against Kelly Sue Park and three others. Diane was shocked. He appealed to the California Supreme Court and was denied.

• 24:32Speaker 02

  Dion says they could have refiled the charges against Kelly and the others, but they were almost six years in at this point. She'd already served seven months in jail for crimes that he says usually end in probation, and he wasn't even sure the judge would let them. So Kelly Sue Park and three others walked free. How did that make you feel when that happened?

• 24:56Speaker 05

  Terrible, terrible. It was devastating. I still feel terrible about it. I think what people need to realize is it wasn't a dismissal based on the facts that were alleged. It was a dismissal based on a procedural error.

• 25:14Speaker 02

  So many people in Juliana Redding's friends, family, and her circle were heartbroken to see Kelly Park walk free. Is there anything that you would like to say to them?

• 25:25Speaker 05

  Well, what I would say personally is I spent my whole career fighting for victims of crime, especially violent crime. And so I understand the heartbreak that they felt upon the acquittal of the murder case. We didn't get complete justice against everybody, but we did get justice and we told the story. And I think the world can now look at it and see it for what it is. So I think we have a lot to be proud of in that regard. And again, it wasn't perfect, but it rarely is.

• 26:17Speaker 02

  And that was the end. Until it wasn't.

• 26:22Speaker 03

  One of the first pieces of evidence that we found was a bill that was submitted to an insurance company for treatment by a doctor on a specific date. Well, that doctor on that date was in jail in LA, so it was impossible that he could have performed this service.

• 26:39Speaker 02

  You think taking down one $150 million scam can stop these guys? Stick around.

• 26:50Speaker 03

  You're listening to a quick ad. You know what else is quick? Selling your car on Carvana. Just put in your vehicle information and we'll give you an offer. Done. No hassle, no negotiation, no guy from an online listing lowballing you. Which means by the time I'm done explaining this, you could have basically done it.

• 27:14Speaker 03

  Still haven't started? Hey, better late than ever. Sell your car today on Carvana. Pickup fees may apply.

• 27:21Speaker 00

  Hey Spotify listeners. When you travel with American Airlines, you'll enjoy comfort and convenience at every altitude. Before takeoff, unwind in the Admirals Club Lounge with curated self-serve offerings of hearty bites and refreshments. In flight, stay connected with high-speed Wi-Fi. Sponsored by AT&T. Your journey is designed to feel easy from the moment you check in to the moment you arrive. No matter where you're going, American gets you there. Book now at aa.com.

• 27:48Speaker 02

  When the grand jury indictments came down in LA, it didn't stop the fraud. It just changed it.

• 27:55Speaker 03

  Hi, my name is Matt Murray. I'm a prosecutor in Riverside County.

• 27:59Speaker 00

  Erica Moll here, another prosecutor with Riverside County.

• 28:03Speaker 02

  When Frontline Medical made headlines in LA, Matt and Erica saw something strange start happening in their jurisdiction, Riverside County, right next door.

• 28:13Speaker 03

  When the Los Angeles indictments came down and all of that started really to go, Ueda essentially gave field promotions to the people who hadn't been arrested in LA.

• 28:26Speaker 02

  Another company, Blue Oak Medical, suddenly started billing insane amounts, seeming to closely follow Frontline Medical's playbook.

• 28:35Speaker 00

  You knew when people disappeared, i.e. got arrested, then all of a sudden they started using, utilizing the name or Blue Oak, and they started changing the paperwork.

• 28:44Speaker 03

  We had a bunch of employees tell us, yeah, I worked for Frontline and then I worked for Blue Oak.

• 28:48Speaker 02

  But Erica and Matt say with Blue Oak, the scheme evolved. Instead of a sprawling empire, all sides of that Wheel of Fortune we talked about, Blue Oak was focused on pharmaceuticals. New brand, fresh start, different strategy. Let's go.

• 29:03Speaker 03

  For the most part, the main offices generally were the same. Basically, one day it was Frontline, and the next day it was Blue Oak, and basically everything else was the same.

• 29:11Speaker 02

  Here's how the Riverside prosecutors described the new scam.

• 29:14Speaker 03

  The nutshell is that Blue Oak was trying to move as many legitimately injured people as possible through their clinics in order to submit what we think is fraudulent bills for the exact same medication that the person in control of Blue Oak was also in control of making the medication.

• 29:34Speaker 02

  The key here, prosecutors say, was that the company was manufacturing new drugs out of inexpensive old drugs. For example, you take a drug that's normally a $10 pill, and you make it a cream, or drinkable. Since that new drug doesn't technically exist in the insurance billing system, you can kind of bill whatever you want for it. Say, 1,500 bucks. It's not outrageous for a prescription drug to cost $1,500 a month. And since the insurance companies are fielding so many billing requests every day, probably that'll just go through.

• 30:09Speaker 00

  So then, you bill it for $1,500, or whatever. So if you prescribe it to, you know, Joe Schmo three times, right? Times 10,000 patients, how much money is that?

• 30:25Speaker 02

  I mean, 1,500 times 3 is 4,500, times 10,000 is $45 million. Matt and Erica found a data set showing that 80 to 90% of Blue Oak's patients, regardless of what they were being seen for, were receiving the same four medications.

• 30:46Speaker 03

  The exact same cocktail of four medications that were all being, for the most part, they're being manufactured by the same specialized pharmacy that, it turns out, was also being controlled by the same people.

• 30:57Speaker 02

  Sound familiar?

• 30:58Speaker 03

  So in that situation, we said, "Look, if, you know, if 85% of our patients are getting the same medications, no matter what their injury is, and those patients aren't even getting them in the mail, then yes, we argue that is fraud."

• 31:09Speaker 02

  And the man behind it all, they allege, was Munir Uweda. At the time Uweda was out of the country, he'd been out of the country for several years, how do you think he was directing all of this to happen?

• 31:24Speaker 03

  Well, there was a significant amount of witness testimony that he was making a lot of phone calls and sending a lot of emails and doing a lot of WhatsApp. So from wherever he was, he was pretty much working remotely before that was a thing.

• 31:40Speaker 02

  Erica and Matt presented all their evidence to the Riverside County Criminal Grand Jury, which after hearing six weeks of testimony indicted eight people on January 17, 2019, accusing them of operating an international conspiracy to defraud the California workers' compensation system of more than $123 million. Which, you know, isn't 150 million, but give him a few more months, I guess.

• 32:06Speaker 03

  It was eight total people across two different indictments. And the way that the grand jury approved the indictments was they alleged that Munir Uweda was the leader of this conspiracy.

• 32:18Speaker 02

  Seven of those indicted pled guilty. Several went to prison for many years. Others were put on probation and/or agreed to cooperate and testify.

• 32:29Speaker 03

  Everyone except Uweda, their cases have been closed. No one at this point is still in custody.

• 32:38Speaker 02

  While I'd like to tell you that there are currently no known remnants of Munir's empire, I can't. When I asked Matt and Erica, they simply answered, "They don't know." An arrest warrant for Munir remains active. Is Uweda still making money in California?

• 32:56Speaker 03

  I don't know.

• 32:56Speaker 02

  I don't know. That's not a no.

• 32:59Speaker 03

  You're right.

• 33:01Speaker 02

  Next time on Doctors Orders.

• 33:04Speaker 03

  I believe that Uweda is a very dangerous individual, and he's very vindictive. You just need to be careful when you're dealing around him and the people that he was affiliated with.

• 33:16Speaker 00

  He came after her. He has all this money, she has none. And it got so bad she couldn't keep affording to go back to court. So she settled, and she pays him every month.

• 33:25Speaker 05

  Do you see that? That is Kadri. That's Kadri? That's Kadri, standing there in the entrance. Of course, that's 100% her. 100% it's her. Wait, I'll take a note.

• 33:36Speaker 02

  That's in episode six, Fear and Loathing, the season finale of Doctors Orders.

• 33:45Speaker 00

  Hey Spotify listeners. When you travel with American Airlines, you'll enjoy comfort and convenience at every altitude. Before takeoff, unwind in the Admirals Club Lounge with curated self-serve offerings of hearty bites and refreshments. In flight, stay connected with high-speed Wi-Fi, sponsored by AT&T. Your journey is designed to feel easy from the moment you check in to the moment you arrive. No matter where you're going, American gets you there. Book now at aa.com.

• 34:13Speaker 02

  Doctors Orders is produced by Western Sound for Sony Music Entertainment's The Binge. The executive producer and host is me, Ben Adair. The executive producer for The Binge is Jonathan Hirsch. Doctors Orders was written and produced by Nada Salem. It was edited by Ben Adair. Laila Hassan is our fact-checker. Legal review by Davis Wright Tremaine, LLP. Michael Rayfield is the mix engineer. Next up, the season finale of Doctors Orders. Episode 6: Fear and Loathing.

• 34:56Speaker 01

  Say hello to smooth, sugar-like sweetness with Truvia Alulose Plus Stevia Sweetener and Monkfruit Sweetener. This blend delivers balanced sweetness that minimizes aftertaste with zero calories per serving. Designed to fit everyday moments, Truvia Alulose Blend measures cup for cup like sugar, making it effortless to swap into beverages, baking, and even savory dishes. Find Truvia Alulose Plus Stevia Sweetener and Monkfruit Sweetener online and nationwide at Kroger, Target, and your favorite local grocery retailer.