INDIAN-ORIGIN DOCTOR OUT ON RECORD BOND IN FRAUD CASE

HOUSTON: An Indian-American doctor, indicted in one of the largest healthcare fraud cases in US history involving a $464 million conspiracy, was freed on a record-setting $7 million bond.

Rajendra Bothra, 77, who was in 1999 awarded Padmashri, India’s fourth-highest civilian award, was indicted along with five other physicians in the healthcare fraud conspiracy, which the federal government said fuelled the opioid epidemic.

US district judge Stephen Murphy granted the bond for him despite the government’s concern that the doctor has hidden money that could bankroll an escape to his native India. Bothra, of Bloomfield Hills, who will be released on home confinement and tracked by a GPS tether, must identify all assets under penalty of perjury, Detroit news reported.

Being the lead defendant in one of the largest healthcare fraud cases in the US history, he must liquidate a $8.5 million retirement account to cover the bond, a process that could take three days, it reported. His wife and daughter, who attended the hearing on Tuesday, will surrender their passports to alleviate concerns that the family might flee while Bothra awaits trial in July.

Bothra has deep ties to India, including investments and several siblings.

He is one of the most high-profile Indian-American Republican Party activists and fundraisers. In the 1980s and early 1990s, he hosted major fundraisers for former president George HW Bush and other senior Republican lawmakers.

Prosecutors have been unable to pinpoint Bothra’s net worth, which could be as high as $35 million.