| For Immediate Release Case # 09CF1651
July 21, 2009 |
Susan Kang Schroeder Public Affairs Counsel Office: 714-347-8408 Cell: 714-292-2718 Farrah Emami Cell: 714-323-4486 |
DOCTOR TO BE ARRAIGNED FOR MAKING FALSE STATEMENTS TO FRAUDULENTLY COLLECT INSURANCECLAIMING WORK-RELATED INJURY
*Video available of defendant engaging in physical activities
SANTA ANA – A medical doctor was arrested by Orange County District Attorney’s Office Investigators today for making false medical statements claiming to have suffered a hospital work-related injury that left her unable to sit, stand, or walk, with the intention of committing insurance fraud. She was caught on surveillance videotape engaging in various physical activities. Maryam Bahramfarsi, 36, Laguna Niguel, is charged with 10 felony counts of making fraudulent statements and representations and faces a maximum sentence of 14 years in state prison if convicted. The defendant is being held on $20,000 bail and is expected to be arraigned tomorrow, Wednesday, July 22, 2009, at 1:30 p.m. in Department C-57, Central Justice Center, Santa Ana.
Bahramfarsi worked as a physician for Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Aliso Viejo. On July 10, 2007, Bahramfarsi is accused of calling the name of a medical assistant from an examination room, where she was found laying on the floor. She is accused of claiming that she was unable to get up after slipping on an oily substance on the floor and falling on her lower back and neck.
Between July and December 2007, Bahramfarsi is accused of visiting two doctors claiming to be suffering from severe pain as a result of her fall. She is accused of complaining that the pain made her unable to sit, stand, or walk for more than five minutes at a time, and telling the doctors that she spent most of her time lying on her side in bed.
Bahramfarsi is accused of claiming that all the prescribed pain medication and physical therapy was not effective, and that she was unable to sleep or rotate her body due to the pain. She is accused of arriving to several of the doctors’ appointments in a wheelchair, stating that she was in constant pain and was unable to walk or stand for more than 10 minutes. She is accused of claiming that she had trouble finding rides to make it to her appointments. The defendant is accused of being placed by doctors on modified work restrictions, but failing to return to work at all after Kaiser Permanente was unable to accommodate her restricted terms. Various examinations, x-rays, MRIs, and bone scans detected no abnormalities and offered no explanation as to the pain from which Bahramfarsi claimed to be suffering.
As a result of concerns by her treating doctors that they could find no objective evidence to explain her pain, Kaiser Permanente hired an investigative service to conduct surveillance of Bahramfarsi on three occasions between September and November 2007. While unknowingly being observed and videotaped, Bahramfarsi is accused of participating in physical activities such as sitting, standing, and walking, which she had claimed to doctors she was unable to do as a result of her injury from falling at work.
Under surveillance, Bahramfarsi is accused of carrying two 1-gallon jugs of water and placing them in the trunk of her car without apparent struggle. She is accused of walking and carrying items to and from a gravesite at El Toro Memorial Park, standing to clean a grave, and stepping onto and off of a step stool while cleaning and decorating the grave and a tree above it. On one occasion, she is accused of driving herself to a doctor’s appointment, getting out of her car without visible trouble, and then being pushed in her wheelchair by a male companion into the doctor’s office.