The United States has filed a complaint under the False Claims Act in a lawsuit against Local Initiative Health Authority for Inland Empire Health Plan doing business as Inland Empire Health Plan (IEHP), a California Local Initiative Health Plan based in Rancho Cucamonga.

IEHP contracted with California’s Department of Health Care Services (DHCS) to arrange for the provision of health care services to Riverside County and San Bernardino County residents under Medi-Cal, California’s Medicaid program.

The government’s complaint alleges that IEHP violated the False Claims Act by making false statements to Medi-Cal and knowingly retaining overpayments.

“Today’s lawsuit against IEHP shows our steadfast commitment to hold accountable insurers that brazenly compromise the Medicaid system,” said Acting United States Attorney Bill Essayli. “We will take every measure to restore integrity and accountability to the Medicaid system and ensure that patient care – not financial gain – is the primary focus of our health care system.”

“The Medicaid program provides critical health care services,” said Deputy Assistant Attorney General Brenna Jenny of the Justice Department’s Civil Division. “Today’s complaint demonstrates our continued commitment to protect the integrity of the Medicaid program, and the taxpayer dollars that support it, from health insurers that knowingly seek to divert program funds for their own financial benefit.”

Beginning in January 2014, Medi-Cal was expanded to cover the previously uninsured “Medi-Cal Expansion” population: adults between the ages of 19 and 64 without dependent children with annual incomes up to 133% of the federal poverty level. The federal government fully funded the expansion coverage for the first three years of the program. Under its contractual arrangement with DHCS, IEHP received funding to serve the Medi-Cal Expansion population.  If IEHP did not spend at least 85% of those funds on “allowed medical expenses,” IEHP was required to pay back to the state the difference between 85% and what it actually spent. California, in turn, was required to return that amount to the federal government.

The United States’ complaint alleges that IEHP developed schemes to misuse surplus Medi-Cal Expansion funding, falling into two broad categories: (1) sham incentive programs and (2) an extra-contractual retroactive rate increase. Through these schemes, IEHP misspent Medi-Cal Expansion funding for impermissible purposes, including spending on administrative expenses, other patient populations, and simply giving away federal funding in exchange for no value in return. The complaint further alleges that IEHP was motivated by a desire to conserve its other funding, thus enriching itself.

The complaint alleges that, to make the spending appear legitimate, IEHP deceived the state by making false statements—which it knew would be relayed to the federal government—about the nature, timing, and purpose of its payments to providers. For example, IEHP internally admitted it was giving providers “free money” but asserted to DHCS that the payments were part of a metric-based incentive program rewarding providers with good performance. IEHP also disguised payments for consultants and technology services as incentive payments by funneling those payments through providers and backdated spending to fall during earlier time periods. According to the United States’ complaint, those payments allegedly were not “allowed medical expenses” permissible under the contract between DHCS and IEHP.

The United States’ pursuit of this lawsuit illustrates the government’s emphasis on combating healthcare fraud. One of the most powerful tools in this effort is the False Claims Act. Tips and complaints from all sources about potential fraud, waste, abuse and mismanagement can be reported to the Department of Health and Human Services, at 800 HHS TIPS (800-447-8477).

This case is being handled by the Civil Division’s Commercial Litigation Branch, Fraud Section and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California, in coordination with the California Department of Justice and with valuable assistance from HHS-OIG and DHCS.

The United States is represented in this matter by Assistant United States Attorneys S. Desmond Jui and Jack D. Ross of the Civil Division’s Civil Fraud Section and Justice Department Fraud Section Trial Attorney Mary Beth Hickcox-Howard.

By Carlos Avalos
An official complaint submitted to Ensen Mason, the San Bernardino County Controller, Auditor, and Tax Collector, reveals a web of self-dealing, illegal meetings, and potential violations of California’s laws regarding the gift of public funds by the office of the San Bernardino County Superintendent of Schools.
The complaint alleges a culture of insider dealing has flourished for over a decade, enriching friends and family while potentially violating multiple state laws. This complaint alleges to have uncovered a systematic pattern of cronyism, nepotism, and conflicts of interest that may constitute violations of California’s Brown Act, constitutional prohibitions on gifts of public funds, and the Political Reform Act.
The scope of misconduct spans from the superintendent’s office to school district boardrooms, creating an interconnected web of self-dealing that has cost taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars while undermining public trust in one of California’s largest educational oversight bodies.
The $3,000-Per-Hour Consulting Empire: At the center of this web sits Sherman Garnett, a former San Bernardino County Superintendent of Schools administrator who has transformed his government connections into a lucrative consulting empire. Since 2019, Garnett has secured consulting contracts with the office of the San Bernardino County Superintendent of Schools paying rates exceeding $3,000 per hour, a figure that would make him among the highest-paid consultants in public education.
The arrangement began through Garnett’s mentorship of Don English, whom he hired at Chaffey West County Community School early in English’s career. This relationship has proven extraordinarily profitable: English now serves as Director of the Children Deserve Success Branch at the office of the San Bernardino County Superintendent of Schools, the very position that approves Garnett’s consulting contracts.
According to internal documents reviewed in this formal complaint, Garnett’s contracts contain unusual “per attendee” fee structures, with revenue splits between Garnett and English’s department. Even more troubling, the contracts require San Bernardino County Superintendent of Schools employees to handle all marketing and recruitment for Garnett’s private workshops – a potential violation of California Constitution Article XVI, Section 6, which prohibits gifts of public funds. Continue reading →

SACRAMENTO (September 10) —The evolving reaction of the contingent of outnumbered Republican officeholders in the state’s capital to Governor Gavin Newsom’s plan to gerrymander California’s political map now includes a proposal to split the state in two.
The concept, to a certain extent, revives a now discarded move by San Bernardino County to break off from California, which the county’s voters narrowly approved almost three years ago but which the politicians who sponsored it subsequently rejected as both politically and financially unfeasible when they examined what secession would entail.
Governor Newsom and the Democratic supermajorities in the California State Senate and California Assembly last month approved a $283 million special election in November to have the state’s voters override the map that was put in place in 2021 by the state’s non-partisan redistricting commission setting the boundaries for the state’s 52 Congressional seats. Already, under that map, the Democrats hold a commanding 44-to-9 lead over the Republicans among the members of the House of Representatives from California.
Earlier this summer, Texas Governor Greg Abbott and the Republican-dominated Texas legislature in Austin undertook to redraw the Lone Star State’s political map, such that in the 2026 midterm election, the 26-to-12 advantage the Republicans hold over the Democrats will be likely to increase to 31-to-7. Abbott, a Republican, and his allies were responding to requests by President Donald Trump’s supporters, who are concerned that the slim majorities the GOP enjoys in both the House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate that were established in the 2024 election with President Trump’s return to office four years after his 2020 defeat by Joseph Biden might be eroded or lost in 2026. The Texas Republicans responded by redrafting their state’s Congressional District Map such that five Congressional districts currently served by a Democrat had their borders changed. In making those shifts, portions of neighborhoods in those districts which are heavily populated by Democrats were moved into an adjoining district where there are already an overwhelming number of Republicans, and neighborhoods from contiguous districts in which the Republicans greatly outnumber Democrats were brought within that district’s borders. This was done in such a way that the strong Republican majority districts from which the Republican voters were imported into the Democratic-leaning districts retained Republican majorities. In this way, Abbott and his Republican cohorts believed the Republicans stand a realistic chance of picking up five more Congressional seats from Texas alone. Continue reading →

California state senators Tony Stickland and Roger Niello State this week were the recipients of a significant unanticipated political benefit from what is or had been an unlikely and unanticipated source: the San Bernardino County Republican Central Committee.
Given that Strickland and Niello are two of the state’s foremost members of the Golden State’s minority party, the infusion of what is likely to exceed $100,000 from San Bernardino County’s Republican Party into their electioneering funds is not surprising from a political viewpoint. What is eye-opening is that neither Strickland nor Niello represent San Bernardino County and the central committee has not yet moved to make any money in its coffers available to the four incumbent Republicans currently representing San Bernardino County in the California Senate or the four incumbent Republicans representing San Bernardino County in the California Assembly.
When party higher ups were queried during the August 11 meeting as to why the county party was committing to concentrating its financial firepower on assisting politicians outside the county, no reason was given. No answers
Central committees are allowed to raise money and support political candidates and are not subject to strict limitations as are individuals and corporations and enjoy even fewer restrictions than political action committees, which as collectives, have fewer restrictions than individual donors.
In this case the central committee, prompted to the action by its leadership, is on a trajectory to provide funding to the campaigns of two particular state senators. The action taken by a majority vote of the central committee was to endorse Tony Strickland and Roger Niello, both of whom are individuals of uncommon substance and gravitas with dynamic political backgrounds that have pushed them to the front of the Republican Party in a state dominated by Democrats. Continue reading →

Monday’s ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court setting aside, at least temporarily, parallel rulings by U.S. District Judge U.S. District Judge Maame Ewusi-Mensah Frimpong and a three judge panel of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeal[s] hobbling the Trump Administration and the U.S. Department of Immigration and Customs Enforcement in their enforcement of immigration law in seven Southern California counties has not, as of press time today, had any discernible impact on the lull in the arrests of undocumented migrants regionally since July.
Judge Frimpong on July 12 ruled that Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s practice of engaging in “roving patrols” aimed at finding suspected illegal aliens and stopping individuals based on race, language, location and occupation violated the Fourth Amendment’s protections against unreasonable searches and seizures and the Fifth Amendment’s guarantee of due process. Judge Frimpong ordered the Trump administration to halt indiscriminate immigration stops and arrests in Los Angeles, Riverside, San Bernardino, Orange, Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties.
The Trump Administration, represented by the U.S. Attorney for the Central District of California, Bilal Essayli and Deputy Assistant Attorney General Yaakov Roth, along with Counsel to the Assistant Attorney General Sean Skedzielewski made an appeal of Judge Frimpong’s ruling to the United States Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit. A panel of three judges with the 9th Circuit – Judges Marsha S. Berzon, Jennifer Sung and Ronald M. Gould – upheld Judge Frimpong. Thereupon the Trump Administration appealed to the Supreme Court, asking for an expedited ruling on the issue. Continue reading →

The Department of Water Resources (DWR), California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW), and California State Parks have confirmed presence of the invasive golden mussel at Pyramid Lake in Los Angeles County and Silverwood Lake in San Bernardino County. These lakes are the southernmost State Water Project (SWP) reservoirs where golden mussels have been detected. The invasive species was recently discovered during a routine water test by DWR; in response, State Parks has updated Silverwood Lake’s boat inspection protocols, effective immediately. Pyramid Lake, which is managed by DWR, implemented exit inspections following the discovery of quagga mussels in 2016.
The golden mussel, native to China and Southeast Asia, was initially detected in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and O’Neill Forebay in October 2024 and has subsequently spread south. This small freshwater bivalve is known for its rapid reproduction and ability to clog water infrastructures, disrupt ecosystems, and outcompete native species.These invasive mussels can also cause significant damage to boats by attaching to hulls and clogging engines, leading to increased costs for boaters and other motorized vessel owners. Currently, there are no effective methods to treat or eliminate the golden mussel from infested waterways, making prevention of further spread to non-infested waterways a top priority. Continue reading →

Abject panic gave way to relief yesterday afternoon when it turned out that the disappearance of a first grader at Donald F. Bradach Elementary School was not a kidnapping but rather a case of a child mistaking a man there to pick up his grandson as his grandfather and the grandfather similarly misidentifying the 6-year-old boy as his grandson.
As students poured out from the 437-student school following the dismissal bell at 2:25 p.m. on Thursday, September 11, some headed off campus on their own or in small groups to walk homeward, while others hopped on busses. The remainder met with parents or caretakers to return home on foot.
Before 2:30 p.m., a mother who had come to the school, located at 15550 Bellflower Street, grew alarmed that her son was not at their established rendezvous point. She redoubled her efforts to find him. Unsuccessful, she informed school officials her child was gone. A 9-1-1 call was made, and was immediately patched through to the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department, which serves as the contract law enforcement agency/police department in the City of Adelanto. The dispatch log shows the sheriff’s department was called at 2:31 p.m.
The incoming call reported that a 6-year-old student had left the campus with an “unknown male,” according to the dispatch log. Continue reading →