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Aug. 29, 2022 - Firebrand - Matt Gaetz
39:40
Episode 67 LIVE: The Florida Rehab Shuffle – Firebrand with Matt Gaetz
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Thank you.
You In battle Congressman Matt dates Matt Gaetz was one of the very few members in the entire Congress who bothered to stand up against permanent Washington on behalf of his constituents.
Matt Gaetz right now, he's a problem for the Democratic Party.
He could cause a lot of hiccups in passing the laws.
So we're going to keep running the stories to get hurt again.
If you stand for the flag and kneel in prayer, if you want to build America up and not burn her to the ground, then welcome, my fellow patriots!
You are in the right place!
This is the movement for you!
You ever watch this guy on television?
It's like a machine.
Matt Gaetz.
I'm a canceled man in some corners of the internet.
Many days I'm a marked man in Congress, a wanted man by the deep state.
They aren't really coming for me.
They're coming for you.
I'm just in the way.
By December 2016, at least five overdose deaths have been linked to Kenny Chapman and his drug treatment facilities.
After building a strong case against him, law enforcement moves in.
We found evidence that further supported not only the healthcare fraud, but also the human trafficking portion of the case.
The Department of Justice arrested Chapman and five others including doctors, owners and employees of sober homes and treatment centers.
There's a laundry list of accusations against them, including bribing patients to attend their drug treatment centers to bill their insurances, allowing many of the patients to continue using drugs.
Chapman is accused of threatening patients to keep them from leaving the facilities, even recruiting women to engage in prostitution.
In 2015, News Channel 5 made contact with the family of one patient who went missing under Chapman's care.
Private investigator Joe Carrillo helped find the woman and says that's when he first learned of what was happening at the treatment facilities.
I didn't think she was going to make it.
The worst case I've ever had of a person that I've recovered that's been on drugs.
The FBI interviewed that woman before Chapman's arrest in December.
Still very fearful of him, because it's not only Kenny Chapman, he has a network, and they're all just as bad as him.
Welcome to a special investigative edition of Firebrand.
We are here to study and take a deep dive into the issue of addiction in America and specifically how some of the crooks and thieves benefit off of a system that uses the addict as little more than an insurance policy with a heartbeat.
They call it the Florida Rehab Shuffle.
And we're going to break down this horrifying, revolving door of abuse.
There's an individual, Kenny Chapman.
You saw him and his circumstances portrayed in our open.
And he operated an entity called Reflections.
Now what you just saw from that open, from Kenny Chapman and Reflections, that's the symptom of a much larger disease that has permeated Florida in particular.
Chapman is just one of a massive cabal of predatory scammers.
We're going to tell you about them.
They prey on some of the most vulnerable people on earth, drug addicts who are seeking treatment.
They essentially coerce people into their treatment centers by sending out Machiavellian brokers who zero in on addicts at 12-step meetings and entice them into a specific treatment center.
They will often offer the addict money and or drugs in order to get them into this cycle of abuse.
Once the addict has agreed to treatment, they now have begun the first step in what we call the Florida Rehab Shuffle.
The addict is typically sent to a luxury resort for detox about 7 to 10 days before entering the treatment.
Here's what they don't tell you.
The detox centers get kickbacks from treatment centers who then send patients their way and vice versa.
There's always the relapse they capitalize on too.
The kickbacks don't stop there as the treatment center will get kickbacks from the labs who do urinalysis and blood work.
Even the owners of some of the sober homes.
This practice is also known as patient or body brokering, and it's scaled to the moon.
The rehab business rose quickly to a billion-dollar industry by dragging vulnerable, unwitting addicts into this repugnant cycle of treatment, relapse, detox, rinse, wash, and repeat.
Meanwhile, the addicts aren't getting the care that they need, that they signed up for, that the taxpayers are paying for.
And as certainly at least one recovering addict can attest, they often facilitate continued abuse at the hands of the economic system that is the addiction industrial complex.
All of this in the name of the almighty dollar.
Now sadly the catalyst for this massive scam was none other than Obamacare, the Affordable Care Act, it started the whole cycle.
Yet another unforeseen consequence of Obama's failed healthcare overhaul.
So joining me right now is a recovering opioid addict who spent over a month at Kenny Chapman's treatment center.
reflections.
He's also our congressional office press assistant, and he's been doing reporting with and for Firebrand for quite some time.
Chris Chella joins us now.
Thanks for being here, Chris.
And before I get into your specific circumstances with Kenny Chapman and reflections and what that tells us about policy, it's my belief that every American has some interface You have addicts, family members of addicts, friends and loved ones, people who are the employers of addicts, employees of addicts, partners.
How would you describe addiction to someone who's never been an addict?
How would you describe addiction?
Because I can't imagine, though people have different interfaces, I can't imagine all these interfaces would in any way be comparable.
Yeah, that's a very good question, and thank you for having me on, Congressman.
I think addiction is just completely and utterly, and specifically with opiates, because opiates are, I think, the most addictive substance on the planet next to nicotine, and they just consume you.
Once you are hooked on opiates and, you know, starts with the pills and then eventually moves on to the heroin...
That is your entire focus.
You wake up, okay, how am I going to score enough money to make sure I don't get sick?
And it's, unfortunately, you know, you have withdrawals when you stop, so even if you want to stop, the pain of withdrawal is, you know...
Pretty significant, especially if you've been hooked on it for a number of years, months, whatever.
It's extremely, yeah, it's very bad.
And so addiction, I guess, in a nutshell is just being completely consumed and trapped and everything that you care about, your family, friends, job, everything goes out the window.
It's all about the drug.
And so you spent time at Reflections.
We've now seen how that system really does trap people.
What was your observation of that particular circumstance?
So what was really kind of bizarre to me was the first day I walked into Reflections, Kenny Chapman was walking around the facility in his three-piece suit with his Louis Vuitton belt, and I don't hate on anyone for dressing well, but he The disdain for his patients was palpable.
I mean, the way he would talk to people and just an absolute lack of respect, like you are almost like you're subhuman.
And I can see now why, after his arrest and subsequent sentencing for all the things that he did, I can see why he acted that way.
Because he was someone who was attempting to, or he was engaging in multiple schemes that were making him rich.
He was not only engaging in false treatment center, urine analysis.
He would have people sometimes pee twice and then just all the different kinds of little things that would just – But it was all about money.
Yes, exactly.
That's the thing.
It's all about money.
It's never about the patient, never about the patient.
And so Chapman, he ultimately – he was pimping girls out of his sober homes and then sending them back to treatment and giving them heroin so they wouldn't say anything.
And then when they would ultimately fail their drug tests, send them back to detox and then, like you said, rinse, wash, and repeat.
And it's part of the reason that happens because the government keeps paying for it, right?
Like, I mean, if you run – I mean, take the human part out of it.
If you run one of these facilities, the last thing you really want is someone to graduate out of the most severe consequences of drug use and addiction.
You want them to continue to be in some part of that cycle that's getting paid for, right?
Right, exactly.
So yeah, whether it's detox, whether you're just still in treatment and making sure that you're getting paid by getting the kickbacks from the labs, getting the kickback from the sober homeowners, all that stuff.
And so yes, it's just making sure that they are...
perpetually involved in that cycle and Providing absolutely no treatment.
In fact, exactly the opposite of treatment.
Yeah, and if you provide treatment and people get better, it's actually disruptive to your business model.
Now, we've been talking about this one facility in Florida, but there are so many others.
I mean, Chapman is a symptom of a much larger disease, and this corrupt practice has absolutely contributed to the major increase in opioid overdoses and in opioid abuse.
Now, the deaths that we've seen over the last several years, absolutely heartbreaking.
Take a listen.
Let's talk about the opioid overdose deaths, primarily fentanyl, because the numbers are staggering, up 91% from 2019. Take a look.
Over the course of three years, all right?
They're at about over 71,000 for 2021. You compare that to 37,000 back in 2019. The trend of deaths are up essentially over 20,000 a year for the past three years.
Those numbers are obviously very disturbing.
Now, Chris, we understand that these one-size-fits-all solutions that put all of the country under the same drug rehabilitation paradigm, they ultimately fail.
But in your opinion, what is the way the government could have a positive impact, if possible, to try to go after these predatory systems and the predatory way that patients are used in these rehab centers?
Yeah well I think it needs to start at the local level and you know we need to have oversight over these rehabilitation centers.
If someone wants to open a treatment center then they need you know strict scrutiny from you know Local and or state.
I think that, starting from the bottom up as opposed to the top down, is going to be much more effective in fighting the epidemic.
I worry about the corruption impacting politics, too.
I mean, you look at some of these rehab centers in Florida.
They are cash machines.
And then they have the ability to go hire the lobbyists, to be able to go influence the policies.
So no matter where someone is trapped, whether you're trapped in detox, in rehab, in 12-step, in relapse, no matter where you're trapped, they're getting paid off of the grift one way or the other.
Are you worried about the sophistication of these networks to be able to play at a very dangerous level politically?
I mean, that's always a concern, you know, when there's so much money flying around, you know, there's always going to be room for corruption.
And, you know, the government, you know, they have thrown plenty of money at this problem.
Yes.
But we have seen very few results.
Some things we have, some positive stuff has come out, like the Narcan, giving Narcan to, you know, emergency first responders.
That helped very much because that is the drug that you can jab somebody with when they're overdosing and save their life.
So there have been some positive things to come out of what the government has done.
Yeah, but these programs, I think there was like 57 programs created in 2017, between 2017 and 2018. And it's like, what are they really doing?
And they could be doing more harm than good.
When rehab used to be something that you only got at church, that you only got through a sincere nonprofit that was not motivated by cash and profits and who their ultimate acquisition would be at some point, but really motivated by helping people.
You might have had less access to those programs, but I'm willing to bet they probably had a higher success rate at helping people out of addiction than these processing centers.
They're really addict processing centers more than they're about rehabilitation.
And I worry, like when the federal government puts a trillion dollars on the table, as we have with some of these things, are we doing that to make people better?
Are we doing that so that There's always a payment cycle to continue to feed addiction.
Well, I think, you know, there can be dual, you know, ulterior motives in that, in that, you know, they, of course, you know, they want to help people, but also, yes, there's that.
But I think that, you know, what's really irritating about so many people in...
In Congress who want to legislate on opioids, whether it be opioids, guns, or whatever, they don't know really what they're talking about.
We see that on display daily.
Yes, on the hearings that you attend.
These people just talking out of their backside.
And that's a concern, is that these people, they're trying to, again, some shoehorn, put a square peg into a circular hole, Fix the opioid problem.
And it's different for everyone.
Some people need treatment.
Some people can just, you know, go to the 12 steps, you know, AA, NA. Other people can just stop.
And they don't need any further, you know, counseling or whatever.
It's different for everybody.
And I think that The government needs to approach it in a more fiscally responsible way than they have.
Yeah, I would suggest we should measure How well we're doing, not by how much money we're spending, but by how successful these programs are at getting folks out of the cycle, not keeping them trapped in the cycle.
It's almost like the government's policies, and of course I agree with you on matters like Narcan, but the policies to continue to fund every step of the cycle ensures that there aren't as many escape hatches.
Right?
To get out.
I mean, and so if there was somebody, you know, watching us right now who felt like they were being treated like an insurance policy with a heartbeat, what choices do people have?
What advice would you give as someone who's now a successful congressional staffer, you know, doing a great job in our office?
How do people realize that they're being victimized in this way and then how do they turn the tide?
I think you start to, at first you kind of, you don't really know, you've got some cool guy with Jordans and driving a Lexus, pulls up to your 12-step meeting and says, hey man, yeah, I can get you the treatment, Florida, you know, girls in bikinis, blah, blah, blah, you know, and so, but then once you get into it and, you know, you start to see the kind of...
The grift.
Yeah, the Yeah, the constant cycle of, wait, why am I paying the sober home rent $75 a week when that's supposed to be covered by the insurance?
And so I would tell people that you're not powerless.
They try to make you feel that way, especially if Mr. Chapman tried to almost dehumanize addicts so that we would feel almost like we had no recourse when he would steal our property.
He stole people's phones, stole people's wallets, medications that they need to prevent them from going back to...
Opiates.
It's terrible.
And so they're just...
Kenny Chapman...
So how do people use their power to be able to escape that?
I would say that you speak up.
There are so many different outreach programs where if you feel like you're being abused by a treatment center, by rehab, that you can reach out to and talk to these people and see if you are being abused.
And I think that more awareness needs to be brought to that.
And I think that if people realize that they do have recourse, that no, Kenny Chapman can't just take your phone, that you can get the police involved and things like that.
And, you know, just, yeah, I'd say just standing up for yourself.
And in regards to how to, you know, get out of, you know, addiction, out of the cycle again, it's not a one-size-fits-all, and it's different for everyone, but believe in yourself and forgive yourself.
Because, you know, in my opinion, if God's forgiving you, What right do you have not to forgive yourself?
The people you've wronged, you try to make amends and you do your best.
Just stay strong and remember that the infinite human potential that we have is more powerful than this substance and addiction.
What a great place to leave it.
Thanks for sharing your experience with us, Chris.
And, you know, I really believe that a lot of the notice requirements that we put around other features of health care, where people have a hotline to call, a way to regain that power that you talked about, maybe it's time that some of these entities that draw down gazillions of dollars in federal maybe it's time that some of these entities that draw down gazillions of dollars in federal funding and state funding, that they ought to have posted notice, where if people feel like they're just being shuffled through the process and taken advantage of, there's somewhere for them to call and some way for them to get an inspector
There's somewhere for them to call and some way for them to get an inspector general or an attorney general or a state attorney involved.
And in fact, that's happened with some frequency.
And it's been private businesses.
Yeah, it hasn't been the government.
It's been private businesses that have been creating these kind of hotlines where you can call and be like, okay, and then they get lawyers involved.
Okay, is this person being, you know...
Transparency is a very powerful thing.
And the more eyes you get on something, sometimes you can fix it.
Up next, my conversation with a whistleblower in this process.
An exclusive interview with a former sober home operator named Malcolm.
Now, we're going to get his side and his take on the Florida rehab shuffle.
Malcolm and I spoke a little earlier.
Take a listen.
Can you start by just telling us, for maybe someone who doesn't know, what is a sober home and what is the objective and the best of circumstances to help people?
A sober home are for addicts that are trying to transition their life back into the world.
And the sober home is supposed to, you know, give the addict a place to live and send them to pretty much VIP or IOP with the treatment center.
And from there, help them get their life back together.
And is it your belief that all sober homes in the market are above board, honest, there to help the addicts, or is there a dark underbelly of this industry?
I believe there's a dark underbelly of this industry.
Everybody's not in it, so you pretty much help the client.
And tell me what you've seen that makes you think that.
I've seen a lot of things.
I've seen where, you know, halfway houses, you know, mistreat the clients or, hey, they might kick them out.
You know, it's pretty much an insurance game for the people.
And if they don't have good insurance, they'll kick them out.
They do numerous things to hurt the client.
And is it your belief that the incentives in insurance are to keep people maybe in treatment rather than make sure that they graduate from it?
Absolutely.
I think a lot of people that own halfway houses, it's a money game for them.
And the treatment center, too, is pretty much a money game for them.
But you have to have a treatment center or a halfway house owner that really cares about the people.
And from there, they can transition into living a sober life again.
Malcolm, my reporting suggests that there are people who show up as brokers to AA meetings, NA meetings, And recruit people under false pretenses.
Are you aware of that practice?
Yes, they do have people like that.
Like you say, they call them brokers where they pretty much go to AA classes or drugs, anonymous classes, and they sit and they can plot on, hey, I have a better halfway house for you if you come to this one.
And that's what they do.
You're absolutely right.
It's like a black market.
And do they get a kickback or a benefit if they recruit people to a particular place?
Absolutely.
That's the only way they would be doing it unless it was some profit involved.
And so, as you've operated a sober home, what are some of the things that people have told you maybe about some of the other places they've been and the challenges they've had there?
Well, some of the challenges were that they would go to sober homes and in the sober homes, they would be doing drugs in the sober house.
Or they would go to a sober home that was not in a good area where they can just walk outside and purchase drugs or something like that.
Or it can be the person that owns the house.
He, you know, doesn't have a good tech.
A tech is the person that watches over the people that's in the house.
And, you know, that person could be selling them drugs, too.
It's a lot of ins and outs to the business.
Our federal government puts billions of dollars into sober homes, into treatment, into all of these ways to try to help addicts.
What advice would you give about how to ensure that these terrible drug dens don't trap addicts unwittingly?
Well I think what you have to do is the number one thing is you have to give them something to fight off the craving.
Like you have some boxing, you might have methadone, you might have you know other ways of fighting the drug but a drug can't cure another drug.
They need something where it's you know natural or they need to you know they need to make it where it is now where in order to have a halfway house you have to have a treatment center too.
You can't have one and not have the other.
What are the relationships that the halfway houses have with the treatment centers?
Do they just basically trade people back and forth, or are they really trying to improve people's lives?
Well, it depends on who the halfway house owner is and who the treatment center is.
I would say, yes, it's all about a money game.
And you can say it's pretty much insurance fraud because it's based on your insurance.
If the person doesn't have insurance, they're not going to house them.
And are the insurance companies aware of this fraud that's happening?
Do they do anything to police it?
Well, I believe that they're aware, but I don't know if they're doing anything to police it.
And when people have done well in recovery at your sober home, what have been the experiences that you've seen have led people to a better path and a better life?
I think sometimes one of the greatest things that can lead you to a better life is faith in yourself.
You know, you have to have that.
Something has to be in you saying that, hey, I don't want to do this no more.
I don't want to live a life where, you know, I'm doing drugs every day or I have to go to detox because I was on heroin yesterday.
So I have to go to detox today or either do more heroin.
You have to have faith in yourself.
And like I used to tell my clients, I always told them the only way you're going to be sober is two ways, either dead or alive.
Hey, that is a great message.
And, you know, what's so frustrating is that in government, we think if we just keep spending more money, that that's what's going to make people better.
And you're totally right.
You hit the nail on the head.
It's all about someone finding in themselves the ability to battle addiction.
And, you know, sometimes that comes from a higher power.
Sometimes it comes from faith, family member, children, something that you want to live for.
And just moving people around in the system doesn't seem like a great way Great way to help them.
If someone were really wanting help and they didn't know whether they were being recruited by a broker for a good place or a bad place, what advice would you give them about some of the first things that might tell you that your road to recovery is in fact this money game you described and not something that really can help?
Well, I think the first would be the tell sign would be the people in the house.
If they're regularly getting high, then you know that's not the sober house you need to be in.
And if they don't have a program telling you where, hey, you have this amount of time to get yourself together and this amount of time, and they're not taking you to AA meetings and meetings like that, then that's not the sober house for you.
So people should observe the path to recovery that others are on.
That are in that environment, and if it looks like it's unsuccessful, well then, it's just a game, right?
Absolutely.
I agree with you 100%.
No, this has been very helpful.
I mean, what do you think is the worst thing you've ever seen come out of one of these bad sober homes or bad treatment centers?
Like the worst story you've heard?
Well, I think probably the worst story I heard was a guy named Kenny Chapman.
And every client I used to get who was at his treatment center used to always tell me, hey, Kenny's prostituting the girls.
He's stealing our medication.
He's, you know, abusing us.
And I used to, you know, I used to first, the first, like, four, three or four-year thing, maybe they're just lying.
But you got to realize that if five or six people telling you the same story, they're not lying.
Like, he was really abusing the clients.
And at the end of the day, Hey, the government did step in and take him to jail.
I think he's facing life in jail.
He'll never get out.
Do you think there are other Kenny Chapmans out there right now doing the exact same thing to people?
Absolutely.
I believe so.
Alright, let's end on a positive note.
What would be the best story, the best circumstance that would give people hope that you've seen the capability to find that thing in yourself to turn your life around?
Well, I've seen lots of people, you know, not their parents.
You have to have, once your parents get in your life, you have a good support cast.
I think that's the best thing.
And I've seen kids that had a good support cast.
They're going to be reporters, going to, you know, redo their life in a whole nother place.
I know one guy, right now he's a lawyer.
He was almost dead at one time.
He overdosed.
He came through a life of sobriety where he hasn't looked back in.
He's been sober for like three, four years.
You know what?
It can happen.
If people find that thing in themselves, like you say, if they have the right treatment, the right path, the right supporting cast, addiction does not have to be A permanent condition of entrapment.
You can liberate yourself from the worst elements of it.
Malcolm, thank you for doing your part to get folks on that road, and thanks for sharing your perspective on the industry with folks.
Thank you so much.
I appreciate it, and you have a great day.
God bless.
Now that we've broken down this hellacious cycle of abuse and gotten firsthand testimony from people heavily involved in different aspects of the process, what are we supposed to do to fix it?
Well, we all know that Congress isn't very good at dealing with Too much of anything.
But particularly issues like the opioid epidemic that require more than just a nationwide cash waterfall for people who are abusing addicts.
As we saw with Obamacare, again, forcing insurance companies to cover drug rehabilitation in what functionally becomes a relapse washing machine, well, that's not an essential health benefit.
Sometimes even the most well-meaning, Architects of this policy allow for the Florida rehab shuffle to occur as a result of unintended consequences of the legislation.
And it's still happening.
According to the Palm Beach Post, in July of 2021, a 54-year-old man, wanted on patient brokering charges, was arrested aboard a catamaran in the Bahamas.
How about that?
And now he faces extradition.
In November of last year, the DOJ convicted two owners and operators of a South Florida treatment and detox center.
And in those cases, it was the Second Chance Detox LLC and the WAR Network LLC, respectively.
These two men, Daniel Markovich and Bow Harbor, unlawfully billed, listen to this, $112 million in treatment that was either never rendered or We're never medically necessary.
A Boca Raton doctor pled guilty in July to roughly $17 million in insurance fraud.
That was his piece of the Florida rehab shuffle.
Dr. Citrin was improperly prescribing controlled substances to residents of sober homes.
Imagine that.
You go to a sober home and it turns out to be a drug den.
And most recently, Chapters Recovery Treatment Center in Delray Beach was found guilty on 48 counts of Of patient brokering.
Just moving people through the system and collecting their money.
Once again, these type of people, the Kenny Chabins of the world, they see vulnerable addicts as insurance policies with legs.
This is more than just some blue-collar insurance scandal or fraud or scheme.
This is treating human beings as commodities.
And it must end.
The problem still exists.
It's happening in America today.
It's not like Congress hasn't been willing to throw money at the problem.
Just like Chris Chella and I discussed, since 2017, the federal government has spent trillions of dollars in an attempt to combat the opioid crisis.
I mean, it's like crazy to me how much money we spend on this with a result that only leads our people sicker and more addicted.
Between fiscal year 2017 and 2018, the federal government spent nearly $11 billion and created 57 federal programs dedicated to curbing the epidemic.
So to cure addiction with addicts, we go get addicted in Congress to creating new government programs that in turn turns around and addicts people.
According to the Pew Charitable Trust's report, this epidemic is costing the federal government at least $78 billion a year.
These addicts, they end up in our criminal justice system.
We pay for that.
They end up in our parole system.
We pay for that.
They end up in our emergency rooms with broken bones and other ailments.
They cause harm to others in times.
And then that has to be a part of the financial cost of addiction in America.
The number is increasing dramatically.
Just this past May, President Biden announced a $1.5 billion funding opportunity for state opioid response grants.
It's another drop in the bucket, but is it really helping us to quell the issue?
Now we agree there's some good that's been done, certainly having life-saving Narcan.
Well, that's resulted in people being still alive today who otherwise would have perished.
Local and state policies should have been enacted to deal with Narcan long ago, frankly.
And in the state of Florida, we did.
I remember voting for the Narcan legislation as a state representative.
But the key is preventing the addicts from becoming victims in a financial hustle where scammers are looking to make a quick buck rather than provide any lasting treatment.
People seeking treatment should not be subject to this abuse whatsoever.
And we're going to do everything in our power to end the revolving door of suffering.
So if you're struggling with addiction of any kind, stay strong.
Know that there are good people out there who do want to help you, and you cannot ever lose hope in that.
I've seen proof that as human beings, we have the ability to defeat this disease.
We have to have the will, and we cannot have the government of the United States making it worse.
Thanks so much for joining us for this special investigative edition of Firebrand, looking at the issue of addiction in America, and we will have updates regarding funding issues and policy changes that must be different.
Roll the credits.
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