A former employee of the Planned Parenthood abortion business’s Iowa affiliate is heading to a federal appeals court tomorrow.
Susan Thayer, a former Planned Parenthood abortion clinic manager, filed a lawsuit against the nation’s biggest abortion business accusing it of engaging in massive fraudulent activities. The lawsuit follows an investigation of Planned Parenthood in Illinois and Planned Parenthood abortion companies in other states having been found to have engaged in overbilling and Medicaid fraud.
Thayer filed the lawsuit against the abortion giant’s Iowa affiliate accusing it of submitting “repeated false, fraudulent, and/or ineligible claims for reimbursements” to Medicaid and failing to meet acceptable standards of medical practice. Alliance Defending Freedom (formerly the Alliance Defense Fund) filed the suit for Thayer in March 2011.
A judge dismissed the suit and Thayer appealed to the 8th Circuit.
“Americans deserve to know if their hard-earned tax money is being funneled to groups that are misusing it,” said Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Counsel Casey Mattox. “No matter what views people have about abortion, everyone can agree that Planned Parenthood should play by the same rules as everyone else. We hope the 8th Circuit will agree.”
The lawsuit, Thayer v. Planned Parenthood of the Heartland, claims that Planned Parenthood’s Iowa affiliate submitted “repeated false, fraudulent, and/or ineligible claims for reimbursements” to Medicaid. These included billing Medicaid for abortion-related services in violation of federal law, deceptively seeking partial payments from Medicaid patients but billing Medicaid for the full amount, billing Medicaid for contraceptives without any examination or even a proper prescription, and billing Medicaid for more expensive services than those provided.
Planned Parenthood argues, in part, that Thayer cannot proceed with her fraud claims against Planned Parenthood because she has not named the names of the women who have undergone abortions that were falsely billed to the government.
Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys filed the suit on behalf of Thayer under both a state and federal law that allows “whistleblowers” with inside information to expose fraudulent billing by government contractors.
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Earlier this year, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott announced on July 24 that his office had obtained a $1.4 million settlement against Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast for Medicaid fraud, with the settlement to be split between the state of Texas, the federal government, and the whistleblower (former PPGC employee Karen Reynolds). The total settlement is actually $4.3 million, including all parties.
