{"id":853993,"date":"2026-09-20T04:56:11","date_gmt":"2026-09-20T04:56:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/853993\/"},"modified":"2026-09-20T04:56:11","modified_gmt":"2026-09-20T04:56:11","slug":"ex-georgia-lab-executives-accused-of-billing-medicare-13-7m-for-unnecessary-tests-wsb-tv-channel-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/853993\/","title":{"rendered":"Ex-Georgia lab executives accused of billing Medicare $13.7M for unnecessary tests \u2013 WSB-TV Channel 2"},"content":{"rendered":"

ATLANTA \u2014 The U.S. Department of Justice is suing two former executives of an Atlanta-based clinical laboratory, accusing them of using church events, religious conferences and senior living communities to generate millions of dollars in medically unnecessary Medicare testing.<\/p>\n

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The civil complaint alleges former Capstone Diagnostics CEO and COO Jay Johnson and former Chief Sales Officer and Vice President of Business Development Austin Whiles caused Medicare to pay approximately $13.7 million for genetic and respiratory pathogen testing that was not medically necessary between 2019 and 2021.<\/p>\n

Johnson also faces separate criminal charges related to the alleged scheme.<\/p>\n

According to the DOJ, the executives allegedly used two methods to generate testing volume and Medicare reimbursements.<\/p>\n

At church-sponsored health fairs and religious conferences, Johnson and Whiles allegedly directed Capstone employees to swab attendees for large amounts of genetic testing that their doctors had not requested.<\/p>\n

The complaint alleges the company then used physicians\u2019 names, signatures, standing orders and other paperwork without permission to make the tests appear properly ordered and medically necessary.<\/p>\n

The second scheme allegedly involved testing at senior living communities.<\/p>\n

According to the DOJ, Johnson and Whiles allegedly added medically unnecessary respiratory pathogen panels to COVID-19 tests requested by senior living communities, increasing the amount Medicare reimbursed Capstone.<\/p>\n

The government alleges the defendants improperly used community- and chain-wide standing orders, copied physician signatures, standardized diagnosis codes and had sales employees enter orders instead of treating physicians.<\/p>\n

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The complaint also alleges the defendants paid unlawful remuneration in violation of the federal Anti-Kickback Statute.<\/p>\n

\u201cJohnson and Whiles allegedly took advantage of individuals at religious events and senior living facilities to line their pockets and drain millions of dollars from the Medicare trust fund,\u201d U.S. Attorney Theodore S. Hertzberg said.<\/p>\n

The DOJ alleges Johnson transferred millions of dollars from the schemes to his now-former wife, Sarah Haslock. Whiles allegedly secretly routed approximately $4.75 million in volume-based commissions to himself from independent marketers.<\/p>\n

The government has also reached separate settlements with Capstone and its owner, Andrew Maloney, for $14.3 million, and with Capstone\u2019s billing company, VitalAxis Inc., for $300,479 to resolve potential civil liability under the False Claims Act.<\/p>\n

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The case stems from a whistleblower lawsuit filed by Jesse Allen, a former laboratory manager at Capstone. On Sept. 4, 2026, the United States intervened in that case, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia.<\/p>\n

Under the False Claims Act, private citizens can bring lawsuits on behalf of the government and may share in money recovered by the United States.<\/p>\n

Johnson was also indicted by a federal grand jury on Dec. 10, 2025, on charges including conspiracy to commit health care and wire fraud, health care fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy to receive and pay kickbacks, and payment of kickbacks involving a federal health care program.<\/p>\n

Those criminal charges remain pending.<\/p>\n

\u00a92026 Cox Media Group<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ATLANTA \u2014 The U.S. Department of Justice is suing two former executives of an Atlanta-based clinical laboratory, accusing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":853994,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[97,252,253],"class_list":["post-853993","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health-care","tag-health","tag-health-care","tag-healthcare"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/853993","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=853993"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/853993\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/853994"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=853993"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=853993"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=853993"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}