Psychologist from North Carolina, Dr. Malik Muhammad sentenced for Medicaid fraud

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Durham, North Carolina, clinical psychologist was sentenced Feb. 1, 2022, to 52 months in prison for defrauding Virginia Medicaid of at least $544,067.69. He was accused of doing so by creating false diagnoses and medical records for Medicaid recipients, mostly minors, and falsely representing to Medicaid that he was providing them mental health services.

According to court documents referred to in the press release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia, Dr. Malik Muhammad, Ph.D., 46, obtained identifying information of Medicaid recipients from a co-conspirator and used that information to bill Virginia Medicaid for outpatient psychotherapy that never actually occurred.

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Muhammad was sentenced by U.S. District Judge David J. Novak.

A licensed clinical psychologist, Muhammad hired a co-conspirator to write patient medical records as if he had performed actual therapy and created inapplicable diagnoses—including depression, anxiety, attention deficit disorder, and post-traumatic stress disorder—to give the appearance of actual treatment.

The mostly minor victims were unaware of the false diagnoses Muhammad was inventing and applying to them, the press release said.