The general manager of a West Hollywood ambulance company pleaded guilty on Sept. 15 in federal court in Los Angeles to conspiracy to commit Medicare fraud, conspiracy to obstruct a Medicare audit, and making false statements to law enforcement officers.

Wesley Harlan Kingsbury, 34, who resides in the Inland Empire community of Bloomington, pleaded guilty to the charges before U.S. District Judge Dale S. Fischer. A sentencing hearing is scheduled on Feb. 9.

According to court documents, Kingsbury was the general manager of Alpha Ambulance Inc., which provided non-emergency ambulance transportation services to Medicare beneficiaries, primarily to and from dialysis treatments. Between April 2010 and July 2012, Kingsbury conspired with Alex Kapri and Aleksey (Russ) Muratov, the owners of Alpha Ambulance, as well as training supervisor Danielle Medina, to bill Medicare for ambulance transportation services for individuals that Kingsbury knew did not need to be transported by ambulance.

Additionally, as general manager of the business, Kingsbury instructed emergency medical technicians who worked at Alpha Ambulance to conceal the true medical condition of patients they were transporting by altering requisite paperwork and creating false reasons to justify the transportation services.

In early 2012, Medicare notified Alpha Ambulance that the company would be subject to a Medicare audit. In response, Kingsbury and his co-conspirators altered patient documentation to create false justifications for the ambulance transportation services.

Kingsbury and others used light tracing tables to trace over original documents and create falsified patient documentation for the purpose of sending those falsified documents to Medicare. They also used a paper shredder to destroy the original patient documents.

Kingsbury and his co-conspirators submitted approximately $5.5 million in fraudulent claims to Medicare, and Medicare paid approximately $1.3 on the claims.

In April 2012, Kingsbury was approached by law enforcement officers and was asked to assist with the investigation into Alpha Ambulance. Kingsbury disclosed to the owners of Alpha Ambulance the names of the law enforcement officers who were conducting the investigation and the questions they had asked about the company.

On May 1, 2012, Kingsbury falsely denied to the law enforcement agents that he had previously disclosed the information to the owners of Alpha.

Kapri, Muratov and Medina pleaded guilty last Oct. 28 to conspiracy to commit health care fraud. They were sentenced to prison terms of 75 months, 108 months, and 30 months, respectively.