A hefty million-dollar payout has been coughed up by the Windy City's own Apollo Health Inc. and its chief, Brian J. Weinstein, to settle claims they played fast and loose with Medicare billing. The pair were caught out for submitting bogus claims for care plan oversight services, as per the consent judgment released by the U.S. District Court in Chicago.

The deceit unfurled in an indictment of medical malpractice, where Apollo, under Weinstein's hand, dropped 12,592 claims for Medicare reimbursement. The services were never rendered, the physicians supposedly on the job were mere phantom providers. This all came to light in a document filed by the court that described the submitted claims for supervisory care-style services that had never actually touched the patients' lives.

Not a detail was missed by the government watchdogs, with Acting U.S. Attorney Morris Pasqual, Special Agent-in-Charge Mario Pinto of the HHS Office of the Inspector General, and the Chicago FBI's top agent Wes Wheeler, unequaled in their pursuit. Their probe culminated in a civil lawsuit under the whistleblower provisions of the False Claims Act, as detailed in a release by the Justice Department.

In a prior twist of legal fate, Weinstein had already owned up to a healthcare fraud charge, getting off with a slap of probation for three years—a far cry from the seven-figure shakedown his company is now enduring. The settlement was shepherded through the courts by Assistant U.S. Attorney Virginia Hancock, tasked with pinning down the financial penance for Apollo's feigned claims.

Chicago's corporate scene is no stranger to controversy but laying millions on the table in a Medicare sham is a bold display of the fraud game. The fed's intervention speaks volumes about the vigilance against those who try to bilk the system.