MISTAKES WERE MADE –

April 25, 2024 – Kevin M. Dickau, 35, was sentenced on Tuesday to 15 months in federal prison. He and Dr. Akikur Mohammad of West Hills. CA pleaded guilty to the scheme in 2020, and at that point, Dickau faced a sentence of up to 10 years. Mohammad was previously featured on KTLA as an expert on addiction and alcoholism.

Dickau, Mohammad and five others worked together in California and multiple other states to “identify and recruit potential patients … who were addicted to heroin or other drugs and who had robust private health insurance,” the release said. Sometimes, that involved giving the patients cash payments, “often as much as several thousand dollars,” the release added.

In exchange for convincing patients to “travel to and enroll in rehabilitation when they otherwise would not have,” recruiters would receive kickbacks from rehab facilities of about $5,000 to $10,000 per patient, prosecutors said.

CONTINUE@KTLA