Federal investigators in South Florida have been conducting a criminal investigation that includes transactions connected to Jim Biden, as confirmed by two individuals familiar with the matter. The investigation is still ongoing, according to one of the sources.
In Pennsylvania, officials from the Justice Department who are handling an ongoing Medicare fraud case were inquiring about the activities of President Joe Biden’s brother as recently as last year, according to a reliable source familiar with the case. The source, who wishes to remain anonymous due to the sensitivity of the matter, revealed this information.
The Biden family finds itself in a precarious legal situation, as new revelations continue to emerge. This comes at a time when House Republicans are actively pursuing an impeachment inquiry focused on the Biden family’s business dealings. Additionally, Hunter Biden is currently facing federal tax charges in California and gun charges in Delaware. These developments only serve to deepen the potential legal challenges for the first family.
In recent investigations, Americore, a troubled hospital chain, has come under scrutiny. It is worth noting that Jim Biden, brother of President Joe Biden, had collaborated with this chain following his departure from the Obama administration.
In Pennsylvania, a health care entrepreneur has admitted his involvement in an alleged fraud scheme, according to prosecutors. They claim that an Americore hospital in the state received tens of millions of dollars in Medicare reimbursements that were deemed improper.
According to reports, Jim Biden and his business partners in Florida are being investigated for their alleged involvement in securing investments from Middle Eastern sources. The objective behind these dealings was to obtain funding for Americore and other business ventures in the United States.
According to one person familiar with the case, investigators in Florida are seeking information regarding an agreement that Jim Biden was involved in. Additionally, they have been closely examining a series of loans made to Americore by an investment fund associated with Jim Biden. In his testimony to Congress last month, Jim Biden admitted to being paid to facilitate some of these loans.
A lawsuit filed in Palm Beach County in 2022 has brought to light allegations of improper payments received by Jim Biden. The investors of the Third Friday Total Return Fund claim that the fund’s money manager engaged in fraudulent activities by providing fake loans to Americore, ultimately embezzling millions of dollars. It is further alleged that approximately $600,000 of the stolen funds were diverted to Jim Biden.
Jim Biden, in a transaction that he and the White House have stated was a loan repayment, transferred $200,000 of the disputed money to Joe Biden.
In some of the loans being examined, there is an additional connection to the Bidens that has not been previously reported. A recently obtained email from POLITICO reveals that George Mesires, a lawyer who has worked with Jim and Hunter Biden, represented the lender in certain transactions. Mesires has not provided any comment in response to inquiries.
Jim Biden is not listed as a defendant in the Palm Beach lawsuit, and it remains uncertain whether his actions are a focal point in either of the ongoing criminal investigations.
Jim Biden’s representatives were contacted for comment, and the response from his lawyer, Paul Fishman, stated that Jim Biden is not currently under investigation by federal law enforcement in Florida or Pennsylvania. Fishman added that he is unaware of any ongoing or recent executive branch investigations involving his client. However, he did not provide further details on how he obtained this information regarding the Florida and Pennsylvania cases.
The South Florida Office of the Justice Department has chosen not to provide a comment, while the Western Pennsylvania office has not responded to the request for comment.
In 2017, Jim Biden ventured into the health care industry after his brother, Joe Biden, stepped down as vice president. A recent investigation by POLITICO shed light on Jim Biden’s involvement in promoting the hospital chain, Americore, by leveraging his brother’s name. It was discovered that several individuals from Joe Biden’s inner circle either worked for Americore or engaged in meetings with its representatives prior to his presidential campaign in 2020. However, the investigation did not find any evidence of Joe Biden’s direct involvement in the company.
Jim Biden collaborated with a team of business partners based in Florida to secure investments for Americore and other companies from Middle Eastern sources.
But Americore did not receive the expected investment funding its executives were banking on. Unfortunately, the company filed for bankruptcy in 2019, and its subsequent legal and political controversies have kept it in the spotlight ever since.
Michael Lewitt, a well-known money manager, operated a widely read investing newsletter and managed the Third Friday fund. Meanwhile, Amer Rustom, the CEO of the Platinum Group, a business development company, proudly highlighted his connections with influential figures in the Middle East.
The Platinum Group did not provide any comments when requested. When contacted, a person associated with Rustom mentioned that Rustom was currently out of the country. However, Rustom did not respond to a comment request left with that person. The Florida law firm Cohen Norris, which has previously represented Rustom, also did not respond to comment requests.
On January 12, the initial loan coincided with a payment of $400,000 from Americore to Jim Biden’s company, the Lion Hall Group. In his impeachment inquiry interview, Jim Biden stated that these payments, including a subsequent one of $200,000, were partially made as compensation for his role in arranging the loans.
On March 1st, when Jim Biden received a $200,000 payment, he or his wife, Sara Biden, wrote a $200,000 check from their joint account to Joe Biden, referring to it as a loan repayment on the memo line.
According to statements given to media outlets, the White House has described it as a repayment of a loan. A review of bank records by POLITICO previously revealed that Jim Biden received a $200,000 payment from an account believed to be owned by Joe Biden a few weeks prior.
In a previously undisclosed email, it has been revealed that the loans from Third Friday have a direct link to the Bidens. On July 30, 2018, Mesires, an attorney who has represented both Hunter and Jim Biden in the past, sent a message to Americore’s outside counsel, Christopher Anderson. In the email, Mesires informed Anderson that “We represent Third Friday Total Return Fund in connection with several loans made to Americore Health and Americore Holdings.”
In the email, which is part of a collection of internal Americore documents obtained by POLITICO, Mesires requests multiple copies of the loan-related documents. Anderson has not yet provided a comment in response to these requests.
Just a few weeks prior to Mesires’ email, Jim Biden had ended his association with Americore’s CEO. However, he still collaborated with Lewitt and Rustom in the search for healthcare investment opportunities.
The companies claimed that they were victims of a scheme designed to push them towards bankruptcy and steal their business model. They were promised imminent investment from overseas, including the Qatar Investment Authority, but it never materialized.
Jim Biden and his co-defendants maintain their innocence in that case, which eventually reached a settlement agreement with undisclosed terms.
After the case gained significant media coverage, Michael Frey, a plaintiff from Tennessee, revealed that he had received a threat. A package was delivered to his home containing currency from an unspecified Middle Eastern country, which appeared to be stained with blood. Along with the package, there was a message alluding to “torture.” The FBI initiated an investigation into the package, as reported by the Knoxville News Sentinel in December 2019.
In 2019, Lewitt’s fund provided an additional $225,000 loan to Lion Hall Group, Jim Biden’s company.
Lewitt’s funds’ financial troubles also caused a divide between the money manager and a number of his investors.
In 2022, a group of investors, with David Rocker at the forefront as a prominent short-seller, filed a lawsuit against Lewitt and his fund. They alleged that Lewitt and his fund had participated in a “brazen scheme of fraud, illicit self-dealing, and looting.” The investors accused Lewitt of embezzling the fund’s money through Americore and refusing to fulfill investor redemption requests.
According to the complaint, Lewitt allegedly redirected around $20 million from the fund by creating fake loans to Americore. He is also accused of embezzling some of the funds by diverting them from Americore to himself and his associates. Furthermore, it is alleged that Lewitt intentionally deceived his investors about these actions.
The complaint does not specifically mention Jim Biden by name. However, it does claim that one of Lewitt’s partners from the Platinum Group received embezzled payments from Americore, which can be inferred to refer to Jim Biden based on the payment details.
Lawyers representing Lewitt and the investor plaintiffs have not provided any comments on the matter. Lewitt himself has also chosen not to respond to requests for comment. However, he has denied any wrongdoing and has filed counter-suits against some of the investors, alleging breach of contract. The legal proceedings are still ongoing.
The loans provided to Americore have attracted the attention of federal authorities. In September, Lewitt and his fund were sued by the Securities and Exchange Commission for fraud, as they believed that the loans went against the fund’s policies. Lewitt has denied any wrongdoing, and the case is still ongoing.
According to one individual familiar with the case, the FBI has been investigating the same transactions that are being examined in the SEC case.
According to the other, a federal grand jury in south Florida sought information on related dealings involving Jim Biden, Lewitt, and Rustom last year.
Assistant U.S. attorney Eli Rubin, one of the individuals participating in the investigation, is among the officials involved, according to a source. When requested for comment, Rubin did not provide a response. Analyzing press releases from the Justice Department, it is evident that Rubin has recently been involved in prosecuting cases related to money laundering, bribery, sanctions evasion, and pandemic relief fraud.
Jim Biden, on his part, has made it clear that he had no knowledge of the alleged impropriety by Lewitt, as stated by the SEC, as he informed congressional investigators.
“I was completely taken aback,” remarked Jim Biden. “Michael Lewitt was a sophisticated and genuinely kind person. And until last week, I believed he was still the same pleasant individual.”
The federal criminal investigation into activities at Americore has made significant progress in Pennsylvania.
For the past four years, investigators from the Department of Justice (DOJ) in Western Pennsylvania have been actively investigating a conspiracy to defraud Medicare. The investigation is centered around an Americore hospital located outside of Pittsburgh that allegedly engaged in the payment of kickbacks to a businessman. In exchange for these kickbacks, the hospital received lab testing specimens that it then improperly billed to the government.
According to a person familiar with the case, investigators were seeking information about Jim Biden as recently as last year in relation to the ongoing investigation.
Jim Biden became involved with Americore through his connection with Joey Langston, a disbarred trial lawyer from Mississippi, and Langston’s son, Keaton Langston.
According to a previous report by POLITICO, Jim Biden started his collaboration with Americore in 2017. He became involved after attending a meeting with the Langstons, during which they presented Fountain Health, a company that offered medical lab services to hospitals, to the hospital chain.
Jim Biden played a crucial role in assisting Americore in obtaining the necessary regulatory approval to acquire Ellwood City Medical Center, a hospital located in Pennsylvania.
In October 2019, a secret lawsuit was filed by an anonymous whistleblower, accusing the hospital and other entities of Medicare fraud. This qui tam complaint came to light two years after the previous incident, as revealed in the filings of Americore’s federal bankruptcy case in Kentucky.
In December 2019, while Americore was on the brink of bankruptcy, FBI agents visited its hospital in Pineville, Kentucky, as part of their investigation into the complaint. A person who was questioned at the hospital confirmed this.
In just a month’s time, the Ellwood hospital was raided by the FBI.
According to another individual familiar with the initial stages of the federal investigation into Americore’s activities, one area of focus was Jim Biden’s communications with potential investors.
In 2022, Daniel Hurt, a health care entrepreneur, admitted guilt for his involvement in the Medicare fraud scheme. According to prosecutors, he received kickbacks from the Ellwood hospital.
According to a civil suit filed in federal court by Americore’s bankruptcy trustee, Keaton Langston was involved in Medicare fraud. Langston, however, denied any wrongdoing, and the civil case was eventually settled.
The criminal case in Pennsylvania is still ongoing.
Last week, federal prosecutors in New Jersey implicated Keaton Langston as a co-conspirator in a Medicare fraud case. While Langston has not been formally charged, requests for comment went unanswered.
