- Three men face charges accusing them of defrauding Utah Medicaid of nearly $1 million.
- They are accused of recruiting parolees and homeless individuals for false therapy billing.
- Utah's attorney general vows to prosecute those allegedly involved.
SALT LAKE CITY — Two Arizona men and a man from Las Vegas are accused of recruiting parolees and homeless people in Utah and billing the state nearly $1 million for drug treatment sessions that never took place.
Johnny Antanio Hankston, 45, of North Las Vegas, Jalon Hankston, 24, of Gilbert, Arizona, and Johnny Leonel Tellez, 39, of Laveen, Arizona, were each charged in 3rd District Court with violating the Utah False Claims Act, a second-degree felony.
The Hankstons were co-owners of Second Chance Family Services in Salt Lake County, aimed at helping people with drug addiction.
According to charging documents, from December 2023 through March 2025, the two men "submitted claims to Medicaid that were being provided by unqualified individuals and for services that never occurred."
Tellez "while going under the name 'Diamante,' aided and abetted (the Hankstons) … to submit false claims to Utah Medicaid," the charges state.
According to the Utah Attorney General's Office, the men are accused of "submitting more than $951,000 in false claims to Utah Medicaid between December 2023 and March 2025." They did that by recruiting "parolees, unhoused individuals, and individuals with substance use disorders by offering rent-free housing in exchange for their Medicaid information, then billed the state for therapy sessions that witnesses and former employees say never happened. No patient records were ever produced to show otherwise," the attorney general stated.
"Defrauding Medicaid isn't a paperwork problem, it's theft from every Utahn who pays into this system and plays by the rules. These defendants treated a program meant to help vulnerable people as their own personal ATM. That ends now. We will claw back every dollar we can, and we will prosecute the people who took it," Utah Attorney General Derek Brown said in a prepared statement.
"When we subpoenaed records, they couldn't produce a single document showing a therapy session had ever taken place. They billed nearly a million dollars and had nothing to show for it," added Lane Olson, chief investigator state's Medicaid fraud division.
