Toronto-area rehab clinic convicted of fraud, fined $200,000 plus restitution

A Toronto-area rehabilitation clinic has been convicted of several auto insurance fraud-related offences and has been fined $200,000.

Ontario Rehab Centre was charged following co-operative investigations involving the Financial Services Commission of Ontario (FSCO), the Insurance Bureau of Canada, multiple insurers, and the Toronto Police Service.

The conviction resulted from an investigation into a staged accident ring called “Project Whiplash.” According to IBC, insurers paid out an estimated $4 million in fraudulent claims as a result of the scam.

The clinic was charged with two offences under the Insurance Act including:

• Knowingly making false representations to State Farm to obtain payments for services provided to auto insurance claimants; and 
• Charging amounts to State Farm for the payment of services that were not provided.

The Ontario Court of Justice found the clinic guilty on both counts and imposed the maximum fine of $100,000 on each of the charges, for a total of $200,000 in fines, FSCO reported in a statement Wednesday.

The court also ordered that the clinic provide restitution to State Farm for amounts that were proven to have been falsely billed and paid, totalling $609,112, FSCO noted.

In a separate statement Wednesday, IBC noted that Justice of the Peace Mark Conacher commented that it was “particularly egregious” that the clinic used of the names and credentials of practitioners long after they had left the company, because of the potential to hurt the reputation of the health care providers.

“These are fraudulent acts that jeopardize the integrity of our healthcare system, drive up premiums, take valuable time from emergency services, tie up the courts and cost everyone,” Rick Dubin, vice president of investigative services at IBC said in the release.

“Criminals need to be brought to justice. The cooperation between police, IBC investigators, individual insurance companies and FSCO helped make this possible.”