Eye Doctor From Farmington Pleads Guilty To Fraud: Feds

FARMINGTON/BRISTOL, CT — A Bristol-based eye doctor from Farmington has pleaded guilty in federal court to defrauding the U.S. government of Medicare and Medicaid funding

Marc H. Silverman, acting U.S. attorney for Connecticut; Anish Shukla, acting special agent in charge of the New Haven Division of the FBI; and Harry T. Chavis, Jr., special agent in charge of IRS Criminal Investigation in New England, said Tuesday that Helen Zervas, 57, of Farmington, waived her right to be indicted and pleaded guilty Tuesday before U.S. District Judge Sarah F. Russell in Bridgeport to health care fraud and public corruption offenses.

According to court documents and statements made in court, Zervas, an optometrist, owned and operated Family Eye Care, located in Bristol, and was a participating provider in Medicaid and Medicare.

Officials said, that between approximately October 2015 and January 2020, Zervas repeatedly submitted claims to Medicaid and Medicare falsely representing she had provided, or determined it was medically necessary to provide certain treatments.

For example, between approximately September 2016 and January 2020, Zervas made more than 300 false claims to Medicaid and more than 30 false claims to Medicare for insertion of an amniotic membrane to the eye surface of a patient when that treatment was either not provided or was not medically necessary, federal authorities said.

In 2020, while the State of Connecticut was auditing Zervas’s and Family Eye Care’s Medicaid billings, Zervas conspired with both a senior official in the State’s Office of Policy and Management and a Connecticut State Representative to interfere with the audit, officials said.

Federal authorities did not name the OPM official or the state representative involved in the matter.

In exchange for payments from Family Eye Care, Zervas, and the state representative, the senior official agreed to advise and pressure other state employees to take official action concerning the pending Medicaid audit of Zervas and Family Eye Care.

According to federal authorities, Zervas pleaded guilty to one count of health care fraud, an offense that carries a maximum term of imprisonment of 10 years, and one count of conspiracy to commit extortion under color of official right, an offense that carries a maximum term of imprisonment of 20 years.

Zervas is released pending sentencing, which is not yet scheduled.

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