KCAL9 Investigation Leads To Raids On 4 Doctor's Offices
LOS ANGELES (CBS) — Four San Fernando Valley medical clinics were raided and shut down today -- closed by federal investigators checking into Medicare fraud.
One of those clinics was the subject of an investigation by KCAL9 and CBS2 Investigative Reporter David Goldstein last year.
Goldstein reports, agents broke the doors, handcuffed some people and questioned dozens of employees and patients. And our cameras were there exclusively as federal and state agents searched for evidence of Medicare Fraud.
They were looking for illegal prescriptions.
An undercover agent told Goldstein that as many as five people could have died as a result of the illegal operation.
Said undercover agent Steve Opferman, "We had a death about a week and a half ago. A man who lived in the city of Ventura. And he was driving all the way here to Reseda to get addictive controlled substances."
One of the clinics busted today was Roscoe Van Nuys Medical Clinic in Panorama City. We went undercover outside at that very same clinic last November.
There, Goldstein saw a man offer to pay senior citizens to buy prescription drugs they didn't need that they would later sell back to drug dealers.
Agents also raided a house in Encino. They found drugs and $300,000. Employees in many of the clinics claimed to have no idea what was going on.