Additional CT officers may have known about Medicaid fraud: Documents

Governor Ned Lamont said on Monday that the state would “leave nothing untramored” when it became known that other state officials about a Medicaid fraud system of 2020,000 in the knowledge of a former office for political and administrative officials and a former state representative who was charged for federal crime.

The former OPM deputy commissioner Kostantino “Kosta” Diamantis and the former deputy Christopher Ziogas were charged by the federal authorities on Friday due to blackmail under the color of official law, the bribery, the conspiracy for the inspection of blackmails under the color of official law and the conspiracy to inspect bribes.

Diamantis – also charged with extortion and bribery in connection with school building contracts in May – informed the federal authorities that he was “shocked” when he received a final bribery payment in a program to help the fiance of his friend to avoid a state audit in this case.

Helen Zervas, who, according to the federal official, already guilty in the healthcare system and the conspiracy for the inspection of blackmails, told the investigators that days before she said the payment, Diamantis said she should calculate how much it was that her Medicaid fraud test would disappear. Zervas also said that Diamantis had told her an SMS that he would tell her what the “commissioner” said about his “friend” when she spoke later, said the indictment.

The indictment referred to “Officials 2”, which was responsible for monitoring “civil servants 3” and both dropped the test of the Medicaid fraud in women under pressure from Diamantis. The charges later shows that “Beamter 2” was a commissioner of the State Department of Social Services at that time, which monitors Medicaid payments.

During a press conference on other topics, Lamont replied to questions about the Medicaid system and whether the current commissioner of the State Ministry of Health Destre Gifford was examined by the US Ministry of Justice. Gifford was the commissioner of DSS when the Medicaid briefing scheme developed in 2020.

“I hadn't heard of it,” said Lamont. “I know that (the department) justice with diamondis. I think you want to speak to some of our commissioners to see what this relationship would be. I think maybe you have come to conclusions why you want to do that. “

After part of the indictment was read out loud during the press conference, Lamont said that the state would examine if necessary. But he also said Gifford did a good job.

“I'll tell you what we'll do,” said Lamont. “What we do every time. Do not leave anything. Diamantis was there within weeks when I learned about the first problem he had. We work closely with justice. If someone else is involved, we will be there. “

Lamont's office rejected a comment on the examination of Gifford and instead referred to his comments at the press conference.

According to the indictment, “Beamter 2” and “Official 3” dropped the state audit of the Bristol Eye Care Center from Zervas, although there were indications that it had contested a fraud of Medicaid fraud in the amount of around 600,000 US dollars by charging the state for unnecessary interventions or for never occurred.

Diamantis was given by a major jury last week, under indictment from which he had helped Zervas to avoid the fiance of his “lifelong friend” Ziogas, that the examination officers started after it was found that they had probably committed medical fraud in their company, the federal authorities said in the indictment.

The bribes took place in 2020 and included Diamantis, which received more than 100,000 US dollars to get DSS to extinguish her audit of eye practice.

Zervas were not convicted, but could be suspended in the federal prison for a maximum of 20 years.

The indictment said that the examination was dropped by Zervas' business, she was not suspended as a health specialist or criminal charge against discipline. DSS accepted a check of almost 600,000 US dollars for the fraudulent billing – a number that was never agreed during a processing process, according to the document.

When Diamantis was arrested last week, he was confronted in front of a federal building in connection with a school building contract bridle scheme, in which he is accused of having accepted kickbacks from contractors to strong local school districts to send lucrative construction projects.

This program was dissolved in 2021 together with a third incident when an ethics examination report published by the government of Lamont showed that the then lawyer of the state of Richard Colangelo may have offered the daughter of Diamantis a job in exchange for increases for the 13-state lawyers. At that time, Diamantis was the deputy commissioner of the State Office for Politics and Management, which was responsible for the financing of a large number of departments, including the department for criminal justice.

Colangelo retired before an official investigation took place. Diamantis was later charged by federal authorities in the case of school construction. These federal fees are also pending.