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The owners of Aspen Medical Resources, a durable medical equipment company, located in Anaheim, California: Jeff Campau, Abraham Khorfsad, Landen Mirallegro, and Ryan McCraken, were indicted last week by the Orange County District Attorney and arraigned on Friday, November 1st 2013, in Department C-5 of the Santa Ana Superior Court. They were then moved to Department C-34 in the afternoon.

The Indictment was unsealed and has overt acts alleged in Count 1 which lay out the scheme in this case.

The details of this case will become public ten days after the court reporter delivers the transcripts to defense counsel, which should occur by Thanksgiving. The District Attorney’s office will most likely put out a Press Release by the end of November.

A search warrant was served against Aspen by the Orange County District Attorney last year on August 15th 2012. The alledged crimes are for Grand Theft and for Making False and Fraudulent Claims. The case was initiated in 2010 by Jennifer Conner, a senior investigator with American Claims Management in San Diego, who along with other undisclosed investigators from other carriers and TPAs, sent evidence of Aspen's frauds to the California Department of Insurance.

Aspen has shown an egregious pattern and practice of overbilling for Durable Medical Equipment, especially for a dual hot/cold unit they try to pass off as two separate machines. Just two weeks ago, this writer received a letter by email from a workers’ compensation defense attorney in Marin County.

This defense counsel stated that she had gone online the day prior to find a phone number for Aspen with the intent to negotiate a lien, and in the process fell upon two prior articles by this writer about the investigation and the search warrant served against Aspen in 2012: Aspen Medical Resources Raided By Orange County District Attorney. Accused Of Egregious Overbilling And Kick-Backs, August 19th 2012; and Search Warrant Served Against Aspen Medical Resources In Anaheim Reveals Double Billing Was Consistently Done For Renting Hundreds Of ThermoCool Hot-Cold Units, September 18th 2012.

She went on to write, “Then today, I received bills from Aspen in the amount of $18,900 for several two week period rentals of what was supposedly a hot water circulating pump/pad for $980.00 for each two week period and a cold water circulating pump/pad at $910 for each two week period.

“Interestingly, when I looked up the purchase price for the unit as coded by Aspen, even with a special attachment for a shoulder injury (the kind of claim I am working on), the retail price of the machine is $224.95. I will be looking into this further and thought I would start by checking with you.”