Rhode Island
RI woman sentenced for her role as ‘five minute queen’ in ‘brazen’ health care fraud
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PROVIDENCE – A Warwick social worker labeled “the five-minute queen” for the speed with which she shuttled through clients will serve three months’ on home confinement for her role in a scheme to defraud the government and insurers while robbing patients of crucial opioid treatment.
U.S. District Court Judge Mary McElroy on Wednesday sentenced Mi Ok Song Bruining, 64, to three years of supervised release, with the first three months on home confinement, for conspiring with her former boss to commit health care fraud out of a Providence opioid treatment center.
McElroy also ordered Bruining to perform 100 hours of community service, and pay $100,000 in restitution.
“People rely on their mental health professionals … for guidance,” McElroy said while acknowledging that Michael Brier CEO of Recovery Connections Centers of America, was the ringleader.
Bruining, who will lose her license, expressed regret in court.
“I profoundly apologize,” she said.
How the scheme went down
Brier ran Recovery Connections Centers of America, with offices in Rhode Island and Massachusetts from headquarters on Wickenden Street, with Bruining acting as the supervisor.
Under the scheme, the office billed insurance companies for 45-minute counseling sessions per patient when each actually received only a few minutes of attention.
Bruining, who previously pleaded guilty, was known as the “five-minute queen” for her ability to shrink counseling sessions to mere minutes. Authorities accused her of training staff on the tactics, equipping one with a bell to ensure that patients moved briskly along.
Upon their arrest in 2023, authorities called the scheme “one of the most brazen and egregious examples of health care fraud the FBI has seen here in Rhode Island in recent history.”
McElroy sentenced Brier, of Newton, Massachusetts, to 98 months in prison for defrauding Medicare while depriving patients struggling with substance-use disorders of needed treatment. He must pay $3.5 million in restitution.
The Rhode Island Blood Center is asking for donations after the fatal shooting at Brown University on Saturday.
Several donor centers have extended hours available as they respond to the emergency.
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Anyone interested can sign up for an appointment on the organization’s website.
PROVIDENCE — The Rhode Island Blood Center’s blood supply was low before Saturday’s mass shooting at Brown University, and it is immediately stepping up blood drives to meet the need, an official said Sunday.
“We were definitely dealing with some issues with inventory going into the incident,” Executive Director of Blood Operations Nicole Pineault said.
The supply was especially low for Type 0 positive and negative, which are often needed for mass casualty incidents, she said. Type 0 negative is considered the “universal” red blood donor, because it can be safely given to patients of any blood type.
Pineault attributed the low supply to weather, illness, and the lingering effects of the pandemic. With more people working from home, blood drives at office buildings are smaller, and young people — including college students — are not donating blood at the same rate as they did in the past, she said.
“There are a lot challenges,” she said.
But people can help by donating blood this week, Pineault said, suggesting they go to ribc.org or contact the Rhode Island Blood Center at (401) 453-8383 or (800) 283-8385.
The donor room at 405 Promenade St. in Providence is open seven days a week, Pineault said. Blood drives were already scheduled for this week at South Street Landing in Providence and at Brown Physicians, and the blood center is looking to add more blood drives in the Providence area this week, she said.
“It breaks my heart,” Pineault said of the shooting. “It’s a terrible tragedy. We run blood dives regularly on the Brown campus. Our heart goes out to all of the victims and the staff. We want to work with them to get the victims what they need.”
She said she cannot recall a similar mass shooting in Rhode Island.
“In moments of tragedy, it’s a reminder to the community how important the blood supply really is,” Pineault said. “It’s an easy way to give back, to help your neighbors, and be ready in unfortunate situations like this.”
The Rhode Island Blood Center has donor centers in Providence, Warwick, Middletown, Narragansett, and Woonsocket, and it has mobile blood drives, she noted.
On Sunday, the center’s website said “Donors urgently needed. Hours extended at some donor centers, 12/14.”
Edward Fitzpatrick can be reached at edward.fitzpatrick@globe.com. Follow him @FitzProv.
Authorities said two people were killed and eight more were injured in a mass shooting at Brown University, an Ivy League school in Rhode Island. Authorities said students were on campus for the second day of final exams.
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