Doctor on trial in kickback case

Details of a long-running health care kickback scheme that allegedly featured prostitutes, cash-stuffed envelopes and private jet junkets began to unfold in federal court Tuesday as a 79-yearold doctor went on trial for his alleged role in the scheme. Though Bernard Greenspan isn’t alleged to have engaged in any of the seamier activities surrounding now-defunct Biodiagnostic Laboratory Services, prosecutors painted him as eager to accept about $200,000 in bribes from the lab in exchange for sending his patients’ blood samples there. The bribes came in the form of inflated office rental payments, bogus consulting fees and even a job at the lab for Greenspan’s alleged mistress, Assistant U.S. Attorney Danielle Alfonzo Walsman told jurors. Greenspan is charged with conspiracy, violating federal anti-kickback laws and honest services fraud. More than 40 people, including more than two dozen doctors in New York and New Jersey, have pleaded guilty over the last four years. announced he would seek the arrest of former President Alejandro Toledo on charges of laundering of assets and influence trafficking. Toledo, who was believed to be in Paris, has denied any wrongdoing. Peruvian prosecutors opened a formal investigation Monday into suspicions that the former president took $20 million in bribes from Brazilian construction firm Odebrecht, which is at the heart of the regional scandal. The prosecutors believe Toledo received the money in exchange for giving the firm permission to build a highway connecting Brazil with the Peruvian coast. Authorities throughout Latin America have been moving fast to charge officials accused of taking $800 million in bribes that Odebrecht acknowledged paying in a plea agreement signed in December with the U.S. Justice Department.

Australia, China deepen their ties

Australia and China pledged Tuesday to deepen their ties on everything from trade to tourism, a show of unity that comes at a delicate time in Australia’s relationship with China’s chief rival for Pacific power, the United States. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, visiting Canberra for talks with his Australian counterpart, touted a free trade agreement the two nations signed a year ago as a success, while vowing to take a “firm stand” against protectionism. The vows of cooperation come just as Australia’s relationship with its longtime ally, the U.S., is hitting its lowest point in decades. Australia was disappointed, though not surprised, by President Donald Trump’s decision to pull the U.S. out of the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact. Relations soured further after a tense phone call between Trump and Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull over a refugee resettlement deal struck by the previous Obama administration.