TALLAHASSEE, FL – Attorney General Bill McCollum today announced that a Miami-Dade County jury returned a guilty verdict against a man late last night, convicting him of grand theft and organized scheme to defraud the Florida Medicaid program. Roman Arias, of Miami, could face up to 30 years in prison when he is sentenced at a later date. The case was investigated by the Attorney General’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit and was jointly prosecuted by the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit and the State Attorney's Office for the 11th Judicial Circuit.

Arias, 47, was the owner of Expo Tech Services, a durable medical equipment company in Miami. Durable medical equipment is characterized as equipment that can withstand repeated use, is primarily and customarily used to serve a medical purpose, and is appropriate for use in the patient's home. Investigators with the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit determined Arias fraudulently billed the Medicaid program more than $250,000 for numerous orthopedic devices by using the names and Medicaid numbers of Medicaid recipients who neither needed nor received the equipment for which their accounts were billed.

The fraud continued over the course of a nine-month period and Arias was arrested in June 2006 by law enforcement officers with the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit. During the trial, the attorney from the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit also produced evidence establishing that Arias never even purchased the equipment for which he billed. Arias was immediately remanded into custody upon the return of the jury's verdict.

A copy of Arias’s booking photograph may be obtained online by searching his name at: http://egvsys.metro-dade.com:1608/wwwserv/crts/IPSAWNSI.DIA.