Don’t Be So Quick to Click That Metric Button

I just saw this and couldn’t believe it:

A Kentucky doctor convicted of Medicaid fraud has been sentenced to five years in prison and ordered to pay more than $10,000 in restitution.
Authorities say 58-year-old Dr. Ezekiel O. Akande of Somerset was sentenced late last week by Pulaski Circuit Court Judge David A. Tapp.
State Attorney General Andy Beshear’s office says a Somerset jury convicted Akande in March for Medicaid fraud and theft by unlawful taking over $10,000.
Beshear’s office says Akande operated the Somerset Regional Pain Center. Prosecutors say he stood trial for receiving payment from Kentucky’s Medicaid program for tobacco cessation counseling he did not perform.
Beshear’s Office of Medicaid Fraud and Abuse handled prosecution of the case.

I searched this story pretty hard and this was basically his whole crime.  He basically kept saying that he did tobacco cessation counseling on, well, maybe everyone.  Let’s play devil’s advocate here.  Maybe his staff clicked the button.  Maybe it was a text macro he kept using.  Maybe he was just getting greedy because he couldn’t survive in the industrialized model on his own. Who knows?  But five freaking years in prison?  Are you kidding me?

I welcome your thoughts on this.  Am I off base on this?  Or, maybe you have more information I am not seeing?

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