Criminalizes acting as a runner or soliciting or employing a runner to procure patients or clients

Title of bill

An act to amend the penal law and the criminal procedure law, in relation to criminalizing acting as a runner or soliciting or employing a runner to procure patients or clients

Purpose

Creates the crime of unlawful procurement of clients in three degrees. Criminalizes acting as a "runner" or soliciting or employing a "runner" to procure patients or clients.

Summary of provisions

Section 1 adds three new subdivisions to section 176.00 of the Penal Law defining "provider," "public media," "runner," and "pecuniary benefit."

Section 2 adds three new Penal Law sections, 176.75, 176.80, and 176.85, for Unlawful Procurement of Clients, Patients or Customers in the Third, Second, and First Degrees.

Section 3 amends the definition of "criminal act" in Enterprise Corruption to include the two new crimes that are felonies.

Section 4 amends the definition of "designated offense" in the eaves- dropping and video surveillance warrants provision to include the two new crimes that are felonies.

Justification

Other states have for many years criminalized acting as a runner or soliciting or employing a runner to procure patients or clients. It is long overdue in New York, a state with one of the highest average car insurance rates in the nation.

This legislation is patterned on the New Jersey runner law and on the federal Medicare-Medicaid Anti-Kickback Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1320a-7b, both of which make it a crime intentionally to pay for patient referrals. Such a measure is crucial in New York as a way to prevent fraudulent activity by drying up the supply of patients for clinics and other providers whose entire purpose is to bill no-fault insurance carriers without regard to the legitimacy of any particular claim. The use of runners is unfortunately common in the New York metropolitan area.

A "runner" is a person who is paid for each patient they send to a fraudulent provider. This can be a very rich incentive for them. The providers commit insurance fraud by recruiting patients who do not need treatment or were not in a car accident, exaggerating illnesses, or, as is all too common, staging accidents. Without the runners, the patient supply for fraudulent clinics would dry up, and New York residents could save tens if not hundreds of millions of dollars.

This bill would criminalize runners or providers who use runners and make it either a class A misdemeanor, class E felony, or class D felony, depending on the aggregate value of the pecuniary benefit or the number of times a person works as a runner.

Legislative history

2012 - S.7451 - Passed Senate/Assembly Codes 2013/2014 - S.3033 Passed Senate/Assembly Codes 2015 - S.2131 Passed Senate/Assembly Codes

Fiscal implications

None.

Effective date

On the first of November after becoming law.