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Dental clinic owners indicted for $1M in fraud schemes

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The owners of three now-defunct dental clinics were indicted this week by a federal grand jury for health care fraud and payroll tax schemes totaling more than $1 million.

Pamela Van Drie, 57, and her husband, Lorin Van Drie, 57, both of Marshfield, were charged in a 40-count indictment returned under seal Nov. 2. The indictment was made public yesterday after the arrest and first court appearance of Pamela Van Drie, according to a news release from the office of Tammy Dickinson, U.S. attorney for the Western District of Missouri.

The Van Dries owned Springfield-based All About Smiles LLC, which operated a Queen City clinic that closed in November 2015, a Mountain Grove clinic that closed in October 2014 and a Bolivar clinic that closed in March 2014. They also operated PL Family Management Co. LLC to manage the clinics’ staff.

The indictment alleges Pamela Van Drie participated in a conspiracy to commit over $885,000 in health care fraud between Oct. 6, 2010, and Aug. 19, 2015, according to the release.

The health care fraud conspiracy made up the largest portion of the $1 million in schemes.

Van Drie allegedly worked with a dentist at the clinics to arrange for All About Smiles to supply dentures and other dental services to adults who did not qualify for Medicaid reimbursement. The two allegedly submitted claims to Medicaid for those services even though they knew the requirements weren’t met. James Dye, of Independence, pleaded guilty in February to Medicaid fraud related to his work at All About Smiles.

According to the indictment, Van Drie allegedly submitted and received $720,048 on several Medicaid claims through All About Smiles.

Van Drie and Dye also allegedly bought Ortho-Tain orthodontic appliances - used to straighten teeth without braces - for $50 each, provided them to Medicaid pediatric beneficiaries and then billed them to Medicaid as speech aid prosthesis devices for around $695 apiece. The two knew the devices should not have been billed to Medicaid as orthodontic services and that Medicaid did not cover orthodontic services unless the devices received precertification. The two allegedly labeled them as speech aid prostheses in order to bypass the precertification requirement.

During the scheme, Van Drie allegedly submitted and received payments for 241 claims for speech aid prostheses. All About Smiles was paid $675-$695 for each claim for a total of roughly $165,700, according to the indictment.

The payroll tax scheme’s total is $194,751, according to the U.S. attorney.

Pamela and Lorin Van Drie allegedly conspired to defraud the government by failing to submit payroll taxes to the IRS from Jan. 31, 2013, to Jan. 31, 2015. The Van Dries allegedly diverted large sums of money from their businesses toward personal expenditures, including a 2013 Tracker boat and trailer, a recreational vehicle, multiple cars, diamonds and funding related to two homes and family vacations in Florida.

The indictment includes a forfeiture allegation that would require Pamela Van Drie to forfeit to the government property derived from the proceeds of the alleged offenses, including at least $885,748, according to the release.

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