{"id":856603,"date":"2021-10-07T13:14:11","date_gmt":"2021-10-07T17:14:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=856603"},"modified":"2021-10-07T13:14:14","modified_gmt":"2021-10-07T17:14:14","slug":"breaking-eighteen-ex-nba-players-charged-in-3-9-million-benefits-scheme","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/breaking-eighteen-ex-nba-players-charged-in-3-9-million-benefits-scheme\/","title":{"rendered":"BREAKING: Eighteen Ex-NBA Players Charged In $3.9 Million Benefits Scheme"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fbreaking-eighteen-ex-nba-players-charged-in-3-9-million-benefits-scheme%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=856603&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/GettyImages-125297900.jpg?w=1200&amp;h=800&amp;ixlib=react-9.3.0\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" \/><\/div>\n<p><span>Eighteen former NBA players were charged Thursday with defrauding the NBA\u2019s Health and Welfare Benefit Plan in a benefits scheme, the U.S. Southern District of New York announced Thursday.&nbsp;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>The players are charged with submitting false reimbursement claims for medical and dental services, beginning in 2017, to the NBA\u2019s Health and Welfare Benefit Plan, which provides players with an HRA benefit and contributions into a health reimbursement account during and after players\u2019 careers.&nbsp;<\/span><span>In total, about $3.9 million in false claims were sought out, and about $2.5 million were paid to the players.&nbsp;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>The former players include Terrence Williams, who has been described as the \u201clynchpin\u201d of the operation, as well as <\/span><span>Milt Palacio, Sebastian Telfair, Antoine Wright, Darius Miles, Ruben Patterson, Eddie Robinson, Gregory Smith, Glen \u201cBig Baby\u201d Davis, Jamario Moon, Alan Anderson, Tony Allen, Shannon Brown, William Bynum, Melvin Ely, Christopher Douglas-Roberts, and Tony Wroten.&nbsp;<\/span><\/p>\n<p>They have all been charged with conspiracy to commit healthcare fraud and wire fraud. Sixteen were arrested as of Thursday, according to officials, and nineteen have been charged in total \u2014 the nineteenth person being an unnamed spouse.<\/p>\n<p>According to U.S. Attorney Audrey Strauss, Williams obtained fraudulent invoices for medical records, which he would then send to his co-conspirators. The co-conspirators, in turn, would submit the invoices to the benefits plan, which would pay out the claims, and then in many cases, send a kick-back to Williams.<\/p>\n<p>Officials suggested that some of the claims that were submitted didn\u2019t seem to add up.<\/p>\n<p>One former player, Gregory Smith, allegedly submitted $48k worth of claims for dental work done at an office in Beverly Hills, California, but was in Taiwan playing basketball on the week he claimed to have received the dental work. In another instance, three former players submitted claims for dental work, including root canals and crowns, on the same six sets of teeth.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis industry loses tens of billions of dollars a year to fraud,\u201d Michael J. Driscoll of the Federal Bureau of Investigation said in a press conference Thursday afternoon. \u201cThese costs are then passed on to businesses and customers. That\u2019s a fraud we take very seriously.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><span>There are some well-known names on the list of players charged.&nbsp;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>Williams \u2014 the alleged ring-leader of the scheme \u2014 had a short-lived NBA career, lasting four years in the league with the Celtics, Nets, Rockets, and Kings. According to officials, Williams received $230,000 in kickbacks as part of the scheme, and in one case, allegedly tried to \u201cfrighten\u201d someone who failed to pay him by impersonating an official. He faces an additional charge of aggravated identity theft for that alleged incident.&nbsp;<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>\u201cBig Baby\u201d Davis played eight seasons in the NBA and won an NBA championship with the Boston Celtics in 2008. Darius Miles was drafted out of high school by the LA Clippers in 2000 and was expected to be the next great player to go straight from high school to the NBA. His career did not turn out as many expected, playing for four teams in seven NBA seasons.&nbsp;<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Telfair become a big name when he entered the NBA out of high school and was the star of the documentary \u201cThrough the Fire,\u201d which tells the story of his journey to the league.<\/p>\n<p><span>Tony Allen is the player with the most prominent NBA career, playing for 14 years in the league, and making the All-NBA Defensive team six times.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>The late, great Kobe Bryant <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/sports\/nba\/2016\/02\/27\/kobe-bryant-tony-allen-best-defender-ever-faced\/81030728\/\"><span>called<\/span><\/a><span> him \u201c<\/span><span>the best defender I ever faced.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span>\u201cHe\u2019s fundamentally sound defensively and he plays harder than everybody else defensively,\u201d Bryant <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailynews.com\/2014\/11\/26\/lakers-kobe-bryant-considers-memphis-tony-allen-best-defender\/\"><span>told<\/span><\/a><span> Mark Medina in 2014. \u201cHe has a competitive desire to compete individually. That\u2019s very uncommon. Most defensive players I face want help all the time. I\u2019ve never heard him ask for help. He likes taking the challenge.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><em>The Daily Wire is one of America\u2019s fastest-growing conservative media companies and counter-cultural outlets for news, opinion, and entertainment. Get inside access to The Daily Wire by becoming a <a class=\"in-cell-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/subscribe\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">member<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Eighteen former NBA players were charged Thursday with defrauding the NBA\u2019s Health and Welfare Benefit Plan in a benefits scheme, the U.S. Southern District of New York announced Thursday.\u00a0The players &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-856603","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/856603","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=856603"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/856603\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=856603"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=856603"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=856603"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}