The web is a very strange and wonderful thing. The other day, in a fit of curiosity and boredom, I Googled a name of a former employer. Around a million years ago, I worked for a family of chiropractors in the greater Sacramento area. This was a business run by biggest bunch of crooks I’d ever seen. They ripped off everybody, in every way – the patients, the employees, the insurance companies. These doctors – who owned their own practice, lived in a big house and drove Cadillacs – used to go into my desk drawer and steal my spare change at night.
They were real scumbags, but I hadn’t thought about them in years. As I said, in a fit of curiosity and boredom, I decided to look them up. And oh, what a little gem of information I uncovered. I knew these people were crooks, and now, everyone else does too.
In 1996, one of the family was targeted in an investigation of insurance fraud. The investigators hit paydirt. The doctor was indicted on 34 counts of mail fraud (for using the mail to send bills for services never rendered), which carried a possible sentence of 42 months in state prison and restitution. Not exactly jaywalking.
Since the indictment was in 1998, I wasn’t able to find out if she was convicted or not. But I did find that her license to practice was revoked, and the licenses of the other two family members that shared the practice were forfeited.
I know it’s pure evil, but it warms my bitter little heart to see a little comes-around-goes-around in action. I knew these people were dancing the edge of the law when I worked there. I’m not surprised in the least that they took things further as time went on. They made a lot of money to which they were not entitled, and you and I paid for it through our own rising insurance rates. We also paid for it in the rising rates of Worker’s Compensation insurance, which drove up the price of our goods and services. Crooks like this are why California’s Worker’s Comp system is utterly fucked. Call it Karma, call it Justice, call it whatever you want, I’m just glad to see it.
There are times in each life when one reaches a certain level of frustration with the selfish bad intentions of others. At those times, it gives me some tiny sense of satisfaction to know that once in a while, the universe balances the scales.