Orlando clinic boss and VA staffer jailed in $11m veterans' care referral bribery case

More than $11m in payments from the US Department of Veterans Affairs and its Community Care Program flowed to a single Orlando provider through a bribery arrangement, the Department of Justice said on 5 November 2026, as it announced prison sentences for the two men involved. Heriberto Rivera received 13 months and Laurent Cassagnol six months. Both are 43.

Court documents describe Rivera as chief executive of Family Integrative Medicine of Orlando, LLC (FIMO). Cassagnol was an Advanced Medical Support Assistant in the Community Care Program. According to the DOJ, Rivera paid him bribes and kickbacks, and Cassagnol used his position to send veterans and their relatives to FIMO for acupuncture, chiropractic adjustments and other holistic services. The department said more than $14m in claims was submitted as a result, of which over $11m was paid.

Each man must also forfeit what the DOJ called his proceeds from the offence: $515,542 for Rivera and $175,172 for Cassagnol. Together that is $690,714, well under a tenth of the sum the programme paid out. The DOJ's account does not say what happens to the remainder of the money paid to the clinic.

The inquiry began with a complaint to the VA Office of the Inspector General's fraud hotline. The FBI and VA-OIG investigated, and trial attorneys from the Fraud Division's Health Care Fraud Section are prosecuting. The DOJ noted that its Health Care Fraud Strike Force Program has charged more than 6,200 defendants since 2007 who billed federal and private payers more than $45bn.