BOSTON, MA - A Freetown man and an Avon woman have been charged in federal court with conducting a health care fraud scheme and laundering the proceeds.

United States Attorney Michael J. Sullivan, Tyrone Barney, Special Agent in Charge of the Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation, Boston Field Office, and Warren Bamford, Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Boston Field Office, announced today that PATRICK GELIN, age 37, of 18 Green Lane, Freetown, Massachusetts, and MICHELINE LAMARRE, age 40, of 212 Page Street, Avon, Massachusetts, were charged in an Indictment, which was unsealed yesterday, with conducting a health care fraud scheme. GELIN was also charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering.

The Indictment alleges that, beginning in at least 2002, GELIN, owner of Premium Care Physical Therapy, located at 793 North Main Street in Brockton, Massachusetts, and LAMARRE, a physical therapist employed there, fraudulently billed insurance companies for physical therapy treatments that were not performed. The Indictment alleges that GELIN paid others to pretend to have been in auto accidents, whether real or staged, in order to seek treatment at Premium Care Physical Therapy, for which he submitted claims to insurance companies. The Indictment also alleges that LAMARRE routinely either prepared false patient charts, including evaluation reports and notes of alleged treatments, when no actual evaluation or treatment had been performed, or added false notes of alleged treatments to actual patient charts, inflating the amount of the insurance claims. It is further alleged that GELIN paid LAMARRE commissions from the insurance payments for each chart that she falsified, and also that GELIN paid “referral fees,” both in cash and by check, to individuals who referred patients to him and to the patients themselves.

If convicted on these charges, GELIN faces up to 20 years imprisonment, to be followed by 5 years of supervised release and a $500,000 fine. LAMARRE, if convicted, faces up to 10 years imprisonment, to be followed by 3 years of suupervised release and a $250,000 fine.

The case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Internal Revenue Service. It is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Shelbey D. Wright of Sullivan’s Health Care Fraud Unit.

The details contained in the indictment are allegations. The defendants are presumed to be innocent unless and until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.