President Joe Biden has commuted the sentence of a former Indiana health care executive who led a $19.4 million fraud scheme involving nursing homes owned by Marion County’s public health system.
Former American Senior Communities CEO James Burkhart was among nearly 1,500 people whose sentences Biden commuted Thursday as part of what the White House has described as the largest single-day act of clemency in modern history.
As the top executive of Indiana’s largest nursing home operator, Burkhart and several co-conspirators orchestrated a massive fraud and kickback scheme involving a web of shell companies. He then spent the money on private jets, vacation homes, diamond jewelry and gold bars. Most of the stolen money came from the Health & Hospital Corporation of Marion County, a public health agency that owns nursing homes and operates Eskenazi hospital.
Burkhart pleaded guilty in 2018 to conspiracy to commit fraud, conspiracy to violate the health care anti-kickback statute, and money laundering. He was sentenced to 9.5 years in federal prison.
Until the FBI raided his Carmel home in 2015, Burkhart was a major player in Indiana’s health care industry. He had millions of dollars in public money at his disposal thanks to an arrangement between American Senior Communities and the Health & Hospital Corp. of Marion County that allowed them to collect extra Medicaid money available only to publicly owned nursing homes.
He earned a salary of more than $1 million a year, not including the money he skimmed from sham contracts, and was a significant campaign contributor to both Republicans and Democrats. An FBI informant who wore a wire caught Burkhart boasting about how he spent “a lot of money on politicians.”
Attorneys for Burkhart did not immediately respond to messages from IndyStar.
The White House and the U.S. Department of Justice did not provide explanations for individual commutations. But those whose sentences Biden commuted on Thursday had been placed on home confinement during the COVID-19 pandemic and “have successfully reintegrated into their families and communities,” according to a fact sheet from the White House.
The federal Bureau of Prisons website shows Burkhart, 60, was assigned to the residential reentry management field office in Detroit, which primarily manages federal offenders in halfway houses or on home confinement. His release date was listed as Sept. 22, 2025.
In all, Biden commuted the sentences of 1,499 people who have been serving their sentences at home for at least one year. He also pardoned 39 others convicted of nonviolent crimes, including one Indianapolis woman.
Contact IndyStar reporter Tony Cook at 317-444-6081 or [email protected]. Follow him on X: @IndyStarTony.
2024-12-13 23:03:50
