FL Fraud Suspect Tried To Flee To Cuba On Jet Ski, Feds Say

MIAMI, FL — A Florida man accused of health care fraud tried to flee to Cuba on a Jet Ski Monday but was caught, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

Federal prosecutors say Ernesto Cruz Graveran, 54, of Hialeah submitted millions of dollars in fraudulent health care claims to Medicare.

According to allegations in the criminal complaint, from February through April, Graveran owned Xiko Enterprises, Inc., a Florida corporation that purported to provide durable medical equipment to eligible Medicare beneficiaries.

The complaint alleges that Xiko, in only a two-month period in 2022, submitted approximately $4.2 million in fraudulent health care claims to Medicare for DME that Xiko never provided, and that Medicare beneficiaries never requested.

As a result, Medicare paid Xiko over $2.1 million. For example, according to the claims that Xiko submitted to Medicare, one physician purportedly prescribed DME from Xiko for about 145 Medicare beneficiaries, and Xiko billed Medicare over $1 million for DME referred by this one physician.

But, according to the complaint, none of those 145 beneficiaries were in fact patients of that physician, and that physician never prescribed any of the billed-for DME.

The government alleged in court that the U.S. Coast Guard and U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers located Graveran aboard a broken-down jet ski in the waters south of Key West, headed in the direction of Cuba, roughly 90 miles away.

According to authorities, Graveran was aboard the jet ski along with one other person, who was known to law enforcement to be an alien smuggler. The jet ski was outfitted with a special fuel cell to allow for long trips, and within the compartments of the jet ski, law enforcement discovered a trove of food and water bottles.

A federal judge in Miami has ordered that Graveran be detained pending trial.