A BOUNTY ON EVERY ADDICT –
Dec. 3, 2025 – Aetna filed a $40 million civil lawsuit against Nathan Young and Co. in 2023, saying Young’s sober living homes throughout Southern California were little more than drug dens that weaponized addiction for profit by cycling patients from one entity to another and encouraging relapse so that billing cycles could start anew.
Separately, federal investigators have been poking around Young’s operations for years, according to former patients or employees, though the feds would neither confirm or deny a criminal probe, as is their custom.
Now, however, that criminal probe is on the record.
Last month, Aetna received a subpoena from the U.S. Department of Justice’s criminal fraud division asking the insurer for “any and all records” pertaining to Young and co.’s use of “body brokers” or “marketers” to recruit patients to their programs. The subpoena also sought records of payments and “kickbacks (whether monetary or in non-cash benefits)” to said body brokers, as well as to patients who were recruited. In addition, federal investigators asked for records Aetna has gathered about how Young’s operations allegedly enrolled people in health benefit plans using false information, and subsequent billings for services; documentation of services provided and “records pertaining to patients’ participation in telehealth group sessions provided by, or billed for, by the programs affiliated with the Young Lawsuit Defendants.”
