Mastermind of $60 Million Insurance Fraud Scheme Receives 10-year Sentence in Manhattan Court
A New Jersey man was sentenced to a decade in federal prison on Monday for orchestrating one of the greatest no-fault insurance scams in New York City history, which included teaching doctors to lie under oath and bribing hospital personnel for automobile accident victims’ contact information.
Bradley Pierre, 41, was also forced to forfeit $3.5 million and pay over $1.5 million in restitution during his Manhattan Federal Court sentencing.
In January 2022, the individual from Closter, New Jersey, was indicted along with numerous others, including licensed doctors, a lawyer, and an NYPD officer. In December 2023, he pleaded guilty to conspiracy to conduct bribes and conspiracy to cheat tax authorities, acknowledging that he led the $60 million crime.
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According to court filings, the scam targeting automobile insurance companies took advantage of laws in New York and New Jersey requiring them to cover claims for certain types of crashes — typically by directly paying providers rather than billing the victim — without assigning blame in order to avoid protracted legal disputes.
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According to the FBI, Pierre and many others managed various clinics in New York from 2008 to 2021, including Veda Medical, Sky Medical, Sun Medical, and Rutland Medical, all of which falsely claimed to be operated by licensed physicians.
Knowing that non-physicians could not bill insurance companies for no-fault claims if they controlled the clinics, Pierre instructed doctors to lie under oath about their ownership, according to the charging doctors.
Pierre admitted in December that he took more than $20 million during the scheme by transferring funds to bank accounts he controlled or just used the clinics’ accounts as a piggy bank.
He also earned more than $1 million in kickbacks by directing prescriptions to specific pharmacies and patients to his wife Nonna Shikh’s law company in order to get more from insurance companies through litigation.
According to the feds, Pierre also made millions by directing patients to MRIs at a facility over which he had significant authority, conspiring with a doctor to manufacture injuries in order to bill for hazardous and unnecessary procedures and bolstering his wife’s fraudulent lawsuits.
According to the FBI, Pierre and others bribed hospital staff, 911 dispatchers, and others to get sensitive contact information of automobile accident victims in order to fill clinics and an MRI facility.
Manhattan U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said Pierre’s offenses were the largest no-fault vehicle insurance scam in the city’s history.
“Through bribery and manipulation, Pierre callously exploited the system, denying accident victims the rightful care they deserved,” Williams stated.
We were unable to reach Pierre or his attorney.