A professional counselor formerly licensed by the state of Maine was arrested Tuesday on a federal charge of health care fraud for MaineCare reimbursement claims he made before closing his practices in Portland and Windham in 2013.
Paulo D. Braga, 66, of Gorham is accused of billing the federally and state funded health care program for counseling sessions that never took place, including ones he logged while he was actually in his home country of Brazil.
Braga appeared in U.S. District Court in Portland on Tuesday afternoon to face the charge before Magistrate Judge John Rich III. He was allowed to remain free while the case is pending on an unsecured bond for $10,000.
If convicted of health care fraud, a felony, he faces up to 10 years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000.
Braga is originally from Brazil and is now a U.S. citizen. He would not face deportation if convicted. He first came to the United States in 1971 on a tourist visa, became a lawful permanent resident in 1975 and was naturalized in 1981.
State and federal investigators began looking into Braga’s billing practices in February 2013 after inspectors discovered discrepancies in his patient files for MaineCare beneficiaries, according to court records.
The state Boards of Counseling Professionals and Alcohol and Drug Counselors later investigated unrelated complaints in 2013 that Braga hired one patient’s husband to do household repairs at his home and that he used marijuana during a counseling session with another patient and suggested they engage in sex acts, according to state licensing records.
Braga settled the state licensing complaints against him by agreeing to close his practices in Portland and Windham and allow both his clinical counseling license and certified clinical drug and alcohol counseling supervisor license to expire on Dec. 31, 2013, according to state records filed in 2015.
In the federal criminal case, Braga is accusing of fabricating patient records and forging patient signatures as part of a scheme to submit fraudulent MaineCare claims in 2011 and 2012 for 40 different patients for more than $5,200, according to an affidavit filed in court by Catherine Richard, a federal investigator for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Inspector General.
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