East Hartford man, principal of a Newington counseling business, charged with defrauding Medicaid

An East Hartford man defrauded Medicaid of about $950,000, in large part by using unlicensed personnel to provide psychotherapy to numerous patients, according to the Chief State’s Attorney’s Office.

Ramon Apellaniz, 34, of Hilltop Farms, was arrested Wednesday by inspectors with the office’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit and charged with first-degree larceny by defrauding a public community, health insurance fraud and first-degree identity theft. Apellaniz was released without having to post bail and is scheduled to appear in Hartford Superior Court on Jan. 29.

Apellaniz was the sole principal of the Gemini Project, LLC, a Newington business that offered counseling to patients with mental, behavioral and emotional disorders. Only one person in the business was licensed to offer such services, and inspectors found that 9,617 of the 12,571 claims submitted between January 2018 and July 2019 were for services provided by unlicensed workers, authorities said.

The value of those claims, according to a news release, totaled $909,269. Also, an additional 462 claims were submitted for services that were either not rendered, or not performed as claimed, state officials said. The value of those claims totaled $39,346, state authorities said.

Jesse Leavenworth can be reached at [email protected]

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