Another Milwaukee woman who operated a prenatal care business is facing 17 different charges, including health care fraud, after she allegedly illegally billed Wisconsin’s Medicaid program for services that were never provided.
Precious Cruse was the owner and operator of
Caring Through Love, located at 6150 W. Fond du Lac Ave.
Caring Through Love purported to be a prenatal care business that provided services to pregnant women and mothers in the Milwaukee area.
An indictment in the case states Cruse advertised services to pregnant and new mothers on Facebook, often enticing them to enroll in programming with the promise of free baby supplies. She allegedly hosted several community baby showers, during which women would be given free baby supplies in exchange for enrolling in Caring Through Love services.
Cruse incentivized her employees to inflate their billings to Wisconsin Medicaid by tying their earnings to the amount they billed, according to the indictment. She also allegedly told her employees to falsify billing submissions to Medicaid. The submissions contained false information on the dates and frequency of services provided.
For example, Cruse allegedly billed Medicaid after she claimed to be meeting with a client, identified by the initials J.L., to help them develop a care plan. The indictment states Cruse did not meet J.L. until “months later” after J.L. spotted a Facebook ad.
Cruse allegedly submitted fraudulent bills totaling over $900,000, which led Wisconsin Medicaid to pay her more than $700,000.
A portion of that money was allegedly used to purchase a diamond Cuban necklace and bracelet worth $18,000.
Cruse is facing nine counts of health care fraud, two counts of aggravated identity theft, three counts of making false statements relating to health care matters, two counts of offering or paying a health care kickback and one count of engaging in unlawful monetary transactions.
In June, another Milwaukee woman who operated a prenatal care business
was also charged with illegally receiving $2.3 million in payments from Wisconsin Medicaid.
