Serving New Hyde Park, Floral Park, Garden City Park, North Hills, Manhasset Hills and North New Hyde Park
$1
Friday, March 26, 2021
Vol. 70, No. 13
N E W H Y D E PA R K
HEALTH, WELLNESS AND BEAUTY GUIDE PAGES 25-32
GOP PICKS PHILLIPS FOR COMPTROLLER
LEGISLATURE APPROVES POLICING PLAN
PAGE 12
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Chiropractor from NHP faces fraud charges Melissa Kanes allegedly filed $800K in false claims from 2014-2016 BY R OB E RT PE L A E Z A chiropractor from New Hyde Park has been charged in a fraudulent health care scheme, according to the U.S. Justice Department. Melissa Panayiota Kanes, a 50-year-old Manhattan-based chiropractor, allegedly used the identities of three different chiropractors to submit more than $800,000 in fraudulent health care claims between 2014 and 2016, according to a news release from the U.S. attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York. “As alleged, Melissa Kanes filed numerous fraudulent health insurance claims for her chiropractic services,” Audrey Strauss, the U.S. attorney, said. “Indeed, as further alleged, Kanes filed so many claims that an insurer flagged her for suspicious billing, at which point she tried to circumvent scrutiny by filing claims in the names of other chiropractors without their knowledge. Now Melissa
Kanes is in custody and facing federal charges.” Kanes, who was arrested on March 16, allegedly submitted “a high volume of insurance claims” to an unidentified insurance company. In 2016, that company flagged Kanes for improper billing and slowed or ceased payments to her, according to the news release. Kanes then reportedly continued to submit claims to the insurance company, but did so under the names and identification numbers of two newly incorporated companies, whose names were not disclosed. Kanes was charged with one count of health care fraud, which could result in a sentence of up to 10 years in prison upon conviction, and one count of money laundering, which could result in up to 20 years in prison, according to the news release. Kanes also is charged with a count of aggravated identity theft, which carries Continued on Page 45
PHOTO BY ROSE WELDON
Elizabeth Fronckwicz and her mother, Georgiana Coote-Fitzpatrick, at the site on Brinkerhoff Lane in Manhasset where Patrolman Joseph Coote of New Hyde Park, Fronckwicz’s father and Coote-Fitzpatrick’s husband, was shot in the line of duty in 1961. See story on page 2.
F.P. man pleads guilty in fraudulent loan scheme BY R OB E RT PELAEZ
lent loan scheme, according to the U.S. attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York. A news release described A Floral Park man faces up to 30 years in prison after the involvement of Michael pleading guilty to one count of Albarella, 35, of Floral Park, in bank bribery tied to a fraudu- laundering around $200,000 in
funds from the scheme dating to around March 2019. Albarella reportedly got involved with the scheme with a co-worker at the Manhattan branch of a national bank, Herode Chancy, a Continued on Page 45
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