2 face sentencing in Miss. Medicare fraud case

JACKSON — The owners of a defunct clinic accused of bilking Medicare and Medicaid out of millions of dollars await scheduled sentencing Monday in what prosecutors have described as a massive fraud scheme.

Prosecutors say Theddis Marcel Pearson and Telandra Gail Jones owned and operated Statewide Physical Medicine Group Inc., which billed Medicare and Medicaid for more than $39 million in services in Mississippi from 2000 to 2005, according an indictment.

The company “purported to provide in-home physical therapy services,” but was really a sham, prosecutors said. Medicare and Medicaid allegedly paid out $18 million that the company billed.

Medicare a federal health insurance program for those 65 and older and the disabled. Medicaid is federal-state program for the needy, aged, blind and disabled, and for low-income families with children.

Sentencing is scheduled for U.S. District Court in Hattiesburg.