Chicago-area nursing home mogul Philip Esformes was once called the âkingâ of Medicaid fraud, accused of cycling elderly, destitute and drug-addicted patients through his network of facilities and billing millions of dollars to government programs, often for services never rendered, according to federal prosecutors.
In sentencing Esformes to 20 years in prison last year, a federal judge in Miami called the length and scope of his criminal conduct âunmatched in our community, if not the countryâ and an âepicâ violation of trust.
Now, Esformes, 52, is a free man, released from a Florida prison on Tuesday after President Donald Trump commuted of his sentence, granting clemency to 20 people in all. The group included former Republican members of Congress; military contractors convicted of killing civilians in Iraq; and Chicagoan George Papadopoulos, a campaign aide who pleaded guilty to making false statements in the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.