Extradition hearing postponed for chiropractor accused of fraud
A representative from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of West Virginia said Friday that an extradition hearing for Dr. Robert B. Burns Jr. was postponed. Prosecutors are seeking to bring him back to the United States from Ireland so that he can face charges that he and three other men conspired to commit mail and health-care fraud.
Burns, a chiropractor formerly of Uniontown, had owned Mountaineer Chiropractic Clinic and West Virginia Health Care Management of Morgantown. He, along with Dr. William C. Filcheck, 33, formerly of Uniontown and now of Morgantown, W.Va., Dr. Scott G. Taylor, 36, of Mannington, W.Va., and Dr. Ronald L. Halstead, 63, of Scottsdale, Ariz., reportedly conspired to defraud insurance companies.
Halstead, according to a federal indictment handed down in September, allegedly instructed the others how to set up the scheme.
In the 30-count indictment, prosecutors allege the group conspired between September 1993 and May 1997 to commit various types of fraud in the operation of Priority One, a clinic that employs chiropractors and medical doctors. Burns, Filcheck and Taylor allegedly submitted false claim forms to health-care-benefit programs for tests, treatments and other services.
Prosecutors allege that claim forms indicated that doctors performed treatments and services that they determined were medically necessary; however, prosecutors allege the treatments and services actually were performed by chiropractors.
The indictment claims the chiropractors were paid for additional services by evading limitations on chiropractic treatment in many health-care-benefit programs.
Although the indictment was handed down in September, prosecutors waited until they located Burns in January to make any arrests. Filcheck, Taylor and Halstead were arrested in late February.
Burns, who is fighting extradition to the United States to face the charges, requested the delay. A representative for the U.S. Attorney’s Office said the hearing likely will be rescheduled for June or July.