3 indicted over Medicaid fraud in wake of Evergreen Recovery rehab scandal

Months after a St. Paul rehab made the news over an alleged multimillion-dollar fraud scheme, three people connected with the organization have been federally charged with fraud.

A 13-count indictment was filed against the three — Shawn Grygo of Forest Lake; Shantel Magadanz of Stacy; and Heather Heim of St. Paul — on Thursday, with federal prosecutors saying the trio “devised and carried out a health care fraud scheme to systematically overbill for drug and alcohol treatment services.”

According to a news release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office of Minnesota , the scheme was carried out through the now-closed Evergreen Recovery, Inc., where the government was allegedly billed for treatments that weren’t provided or services that weren’t eligible for reimbursement.

Additionally, the release notes, Evergreen “recruited” people from homeless shelters, encampments, drug treatment programs and county probation officers, placing them in Evergreen-controlled “sober” homes so that the defendants could “use those clients’ names and identifying information to overbill Medicaid.”

Story continues

TRENDING NOW

LATEST LOCAL NEWS