Burbank man pleads guilty in $23 million Medicare fraud case

A Burbank man pleaded guilty on Tuesday, Jan. 20, to participating in a scheme to defraud Medicare out of at least $23 million.

Alex Alexsanian, 48, entered a plea to one federal count of money laundering conspiracy.

When sentenced, set for April 28, Alexsanian could face up to 20 years behind bars, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

Co-defendant Sophia Shaklian, 38, of the Larchmont neighborhood of Los Angeles, pleaded guilty in November 2025 to a single count of healthcare fraud and is set for sentencing on March 24. She faces up to 10 years in prison, prosecutors noted.

Prosecutors said Shaklian, often using aliases, managed and submitted claims for seven healthcare providers enrolled with Medicare in Los Angeles County. The businesses included a hospice company she owned and several diagnostic-testing companies.

From March 2019 to August 2024, the companies submitted more than $54 million in fraudulent claims to Medicare for services that were never provided and not needed, and received more than $23 million for those claims, federal prosecutors said.

Shaklian laundered Medicare funds by transferring them to accounts in the name of a fake identity, documents show.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office said Alexsanian directed a foreign national to open a radiology clinic and acquire Medicare provider Console Hospice in Van Nuys, then provide control of those companies and their bank accounts and the foreign national’s personal bank accounts to Alexsanian.

Alexsanian conspired with the foreign national — who has since left the country — and others to have the clinic and Console Hospice submit fraudulent claims to Medicare for services never performed, prosecutors said.

The defendants laundered the Medicare reimbursements they received, as well as funds deposited into their accounts, through the phony identity, and used them to, among other things, buy more than $6 million in gold bars and coins, prosecutors said.