Medicaid, Medicare make easy marks for fraud, and reform could make it worse

The Chicago Tribune reports:

If Varnador Sutton can do it, you can too.

Or at least you get that impression from the case of the Indiana man who out of nowhere started billing the Medicaid program for "counseling sessions" that prosecutors said no one ever provided.

In less than two years, he collected $3.3 million, buying seven real estate parcels, two Jaguars, a Volkswagen Phaeton, a Lincoln MKX, tickets to the Indiana Pacers basketball team and $33,172 in goods from Vincent's Furs and Leathers. Testifying in his own defense, before he was convicted and sent to prison last year, he pointed out that the tickets were a gift for his nephew.

The same people who are concerned about private health insurance companies wasting money on advertising show little concern for medical fraud via government expenditure.