Beachwood Ex-Chiropractor Gets 15 Years On State Charges

TOMS RIVER, NJ — A former chiropractor from Beachwood was sentenced to 15 years in prison on state charges of money laundering and theft, two days after he was sentenced in federal court on related charges.

Carlo Amato, 57, of Beachwood, was sentenced Thursday by Superior Court Judge Michael T. Collins on Thursday to 10 years on a first-degree count of money laundering and five years on a second-degree theft by deception, with the sentences to be served consecutively, Ocean County Prosecutor Bradley Billhimer said.

Amato, who operated a chiropractic office in Lakewood from 2012 through 2015 as Chiropractic Care Consultants Inc. and Accident Recovery Physical Therapy, was sentenced to five years in prison last Tuesday for evading more than half a million in income taxes and failing to report a Russian bank account to which he wired more than $1.5 million.

On the state charges, Amato admitted to overbilling several insurance companies from January 2013 to December 2016 and that he used trust accounts set up in his minor children’s names to funnel the illegal proceeds to Russia. He was sentenced to 10 years in state prison with five years of parole ineligibility.

While Amato was out on bail on the money laundering charge, he was rearrested for defrauding the state and Prudential Insurance Company out of approximately $116,000 in disability benefits. The theft happened between November 2013 and May 2015 when Amato applied for and received disability funds for injuries he alleged kept him from working. He was working at his chiropractic office at the time. After authorities learned of the fraud they searched his home and recovered about $182,000 in cash and various forms of fraudulent identification hidden in a wall, authorities said. Federal authorities said he was planning to flee the country. Amato pleaded guilty to second-degree theft by deception on April 9, 2018.

"Amato’s pattern of criminal behavior occurred over a number of years, our detectives, assistant prosecutors and federal partners did an amazing job of putting all the pieces together in this case," Billhimer said.

It was a joint investigation between the FBI and the Special Investigations Unit of the prosecutor's office. The primary investigation was headed by Special Agent Christine Parr of the FBI and Detective John LaRaia and Agent Katerina Huxel of the Ocean County Prosecutor’s Office. In addition, the National Insurance Crime Bureau provided support during the initial stages of the investigation.

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