Joseph Tamjong, 51, of Lanham, Maryland, pleaded guilty to defrauding the D.C. Medicaid program out of $733,405. Tamjong pleaded guilty to healthcare fraud, which carries a statutory maximum penalty of 10 years in prison. Under federal sentencing guidelines, Tamjong faces a likely recommended sentence of between 27 and 33 months in prison. He has agreed to pay $733,405 in restitution and $396,155 in a forfeiture money judgment. In court documents, Tamjong admitted that between December 2014 and February 2022, he was employed as a Personal Care Aide and/or a Participant-Directed Worker to provide personal care aide services to residents of the District of Columbia who needed assistance performing activities of daily living, such as getting in and out of bed, bathing, dressing, and eating. Tamjong admitted that he submitted false timesheets that claimed he provided these personal care services when in fact he did not. As part of his scheme, he even caused Medicaid to be billed for approximately 3,400 hours of services that he purportedly provided when he actually was traveling internationally. On 156 separate occasions, he also caused Medicaid to be billed for 24 hours of services that he allegedly provided in one day.
