California healthcare fraud arrests tied to $50 million

Federal authorities in Los Angeles, California, arrested eight people on Thursday, April 3, 2026, in connection with multiple healthcare fraud schemes that officials said totaled $50 million. The enforcement action centered largely on hospice-related allegations involving Medicare billing, alongside separate cases tied to union health plans and immigration medical paperwork.

Officials said five of the cases involved hospice facilities in Glendale, Artesia, Tarzana, and Simi Valley. Authorities alleged those hospice centers billed Medicare for patients who were not terminally ill, making them ineligible for hospice benefits under the program. The arrests were described as part of a broader set of healthcare fraud investigations rather than a single case.

The largest matter cited by officials involved an Artesia-based hospice owner. Authorities alleged the owner submitted more than $9 million in fraudulent claims and received more than $8.5 million in payments. Officials did not provide additional figures for the other cases beyond the overall $50 million total cited for the group of schemes.

Beyond hospice-related allegations, officials said one person was arrested in Idaho and another in Los Angeles in a case involving fraud against a West Coast labor union’s healthcare plans. Separately, a third person in Los Angeles was accused of forging immigration medical documents, according to officials. Authorities did not specify whether these non-hospice cases were connected to the hospice investigations beyond being part of the same enforcement announcement.

Officials linked the arrests to national anti-fraud initiatives under the Trump administration, which have focused on states including California. The cases also come as California state officials point to earlier steps aimed at hospice oversight. Governor Gavin Newsom’s office said California signed a law in 2021 that halted new hospice licenses and that the state revoked more than 280 existing licenses within two years.

Federal officials said they plan to review every hospice in California and introduce a new public scoring system intended to help identify illegitimate facilities. Details on how the scoring system would be calculated, when it would be launched, and what criteria would be used were not provided in the announcement. It also remains unclear how quickly the statewide hospice review would be completed and what enforcement actions could follow from those findings.