MIAMI (AP) - The first box that arrived at Shirley Shupp's door was filled with braces to help with her arthritis. Then came a motorized scooter, just like the one the 69-year-old already owned. She hadn't asked for any of it - but Medicare was apparently footing the bill.
"There was just something that wasn't right about it," the Houston woman said.
So Shupp contacted her local Senior Medicare Patrol, which did its own research and then referred the matter to investigators. The equipment, worth thousands of dollars, was returned, the case was handed over to prosecutors and the perpetrators were charged with Medicare fraud.
The 4,700 senior citizen volunteers who serve as the government's eyes and ears have been credited with saving taxpayers more than $100 million since 1997. The program relies on elderly people to apply a lifetime's worth of common sense and skepticism.
