Miami Herald - September 30, 2008
Jay Weaver, jweaver@MiamiHerald.com

Cuban authorities are detaining three Miami-Dade brothers who fled to Cuba earlier this year when they were charged with defrauding $119 million from Medicare, U.S. officials familiar with the case confirmed Monday.

It was unclear whether U.S. authorities were trying to negotiate with the Cuban government on the return of Carlos, Luis and Jose Benitez, who were arrested in mid-September in Cuba on immigration violations, according to two U.S. law enforcement officials.

The FBI has not formally asked the Cuban government to turn over the Benitezes, who fled South Florida before their Medicare fraud indictment was unsealed in June, because the United States does not have formal relations with Cuba.

But FBI agents have teamed up with authorities in the Dominican Republic to seize the brothers' property, bank accounts and other assets purchased in that country, allegedly with their Medicare millions.

News of the Benitez brothers' status surfaced in recent days in the Dominican Republic, where the son of one of the siblings arrived from Cuba on Thursday. After being detained for questioning, Elvis Benitez told Dominican authorities that his father, Jose, and two uncles were being held in a Cuban prison, according to the daily newspaper Diario Libre in Santo Domingo.

The Benitez brothers are among 56 defendants charged with Medicare fraud since 2004 who have fled South Florida to avoid prosecution, according to federal records. In earlier stories published by The Miami Herald, the FBI identified 36 of those fugitives -- including the Benitezes -- and said almost all of them were hiding in Cuba, the Dominican Republic or Mexico.

A spokesman for the FBI's regional office in South Florida, Judy Orihuela, would not comment about the brothers' status. The Cuban-born brothers, who immigrated to South Florida in 1995 before becoming U.S. citizens five years later, used their Cuban passports to leave Miami.

HIV CLINICS

The brothers owned and operated a dozen HIV-therapy clinics in Miami-Dade that filed more than $100 million in bogus claims with the federal government's health insurance program for the elderly and disabled, according to their indictment. But almost none of the brothers' drug-infusion services were provided between 2001 and 2004, said federal prosecutors.

The brothers collected at least $84 million in payments from Medicare, which approved most of the claims despite wide recognition by health experts that such intravenous medicine is obsolete.

The brothers funneled millions through sham companies to finance their purchases of dozens of assets in the Dominican Republic, according to their indictment. Among them: hotels, homes, cars, boats, horses, a helicopter and even a water park, all in the areas of Santo Domingo, Hig ey, Punta Cana and Bavaro.

In August, a federal judge in Miami issued a protective order allowing U.S. authorities to seize those properties.

While the Benitez brothers were hiding in Cuba, 10 doctors, nurses and others associated with their network of HIV-therapy clinics in Miami-Dade have pleaded guilty to Medicare fraud or money-laundering charges. They're cooperating with the FBI and U.S. attorney's office.

The latest to plead guilty: Thomas McKenzie, a physician's assistant who was the right-hand man to the Benitez brothers.

This month, McKenzie admitted that from December 2001 to April 2004, he trained physicians at the brothers' clinics how to fabricate records such as prescriptions to support false Medicare claims for "medically unnecessary" drug-infusion services for HIV patients.

The patients received $100 to $150 per visit for letting the clinics use their Medicare numbers to bill the government program.

McKenzie confessed he oversaw the clinics' records for HIV-therapy treatments -- which were not provided -- to ensure the services appeared legitimate to Medicare claims contractors.

THE 'PATIENTS'

Among the regular patients: Alexander McCray, 40, with a record of drug-possession arrests. The Opa-locka man has sold his Medicare number to some of the Benitez brothers' HIV drug-infusion clinics on numerous occasions, according to federal authorities. Among them: Saint Jude Rehab Center and Physicians Med-Care, both in Miami.

McCray, who is HIV-positive and eligible for Medicare, told The Miami Herald that he collected tens of thousands of dollars from the clinics -- money he used for his crack-cocaine habit.

Since 2001, HIV clinics -- including some of the brothers' operations -- have billed more than $1.1 million in bogus charges to Medicare using McCray's government-issued number, according to federal claims records. McCray has not been charged as a "professional" Medicare patient, partly because the U.S. attorney's office has not made the prosecution of patients a high priority.

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