LAWRENCE - A decade after opening an Essex Street chiropractic clinic that became the state's top moneymaker in the treatment of car crash victims, Alan Cohen will go to jail for the same business that made him a millionaire.
Cohen, the former operator of the now-defunct Lawrence Back and Neck - which once billed more than $3 million a year, received a 21/2 year jail sentence yesterday after pleading guilty to conspiracy to commit auto insurance fraud.
Less than a week before his trial was due to start in Lawrence Superior Court, Cohen, 40, of Weston reached an agreement that will limit his actual time in the Essex County Jail in Middleton to three months.
"Dr. Cohen wants to get this matter behind him," Boston defense attorney Paul Shaw said before Cohen admitted to participating in an auto insurance fraud scam in which his clinic treated people who claimed to be injured in phony car crashes.
Cohen was one of 16 people - including four chiropractors and three lawyers - who were indicted in September 2004 by a special Essex County grand jury investigating auto insurance fraud.
Lawrence Superior Court Judge Thomas Billings will allow Cohen up to two weeks to get his personal affairs in order before going to jail. He will join Lawrence lawyers Charles Lonardo and Jorge Elias, who are already serving 21/2-year sentences after being convicted earlier this year.
Billings ordered Cohen to pay a $2,000 fine and perform 1,000 hours of community service. Once released from jail, he will be on probation for three years.
Essex County prosecutor Greg Friedholm recommended Cohen serve 18 months in jail and remain on probation for five years, along with the fine and community service imposed by the judge.
Defense lawyers Shaw and John Andrew asked the judge to place Cohen on probation without serving any time in jail.
Friedholm told the court that between 2001 and 2003, Cohen employed a runner to stage motor vehicle accidents and bring clients into his chiropractic clinic for treatment. Cohen would then bill the clients' insurance companies for medical treatment that was either never provided or unnecessary.
Had the case gone to trial, the prosecution's star witness, Carlos Pinales - an independent contractor known as a "runner" who was paid to recruit accident victims for law offices and medical clinics - would have testified Cohen paid him to bring the clinic patients from staged and legitimate accidents.
Cohen was particular about how Pinales planned the phony car crashes, Friedholm said yesterday in referring to Pinales' testimony before the grand jury.
The chiropractor instructed Pinales to arrange for no more than seven passengers in a two-car crash. Cohen also wanted Pinales to involve cars that weren't insured by either OneBeacon or Liberty Mutual insurance companies because they had "aggressive investigators who should be avoided."
When Pinales visited Lawrence Back and Neck, Cohen "frisked him and lifted up his shirt" to make sure he wasn't wearing an electronic surveillance device. Cohen also threatened "to kill" Pinales if he talked to police about the chiropractor's involvement, the prosecutor said at yesterday's hearing.
Cohen initially paid Pinales $400 for every car accident victim, then increased the fee to $700 later. Pinales also could receive bonuses if he brought in more than 20 patients a week.
Cohen, his Essex Street clinic and other operations that generated $10 million a year statewide were featured in a five-part Eagle-Tribune investigative series, "At Fault: Inside the Culture of Auto Insurance Fraud."
Gov. Mitt Romney later credited the June 2004 series with helping to pass an "anti-runner law" that made it a criminal offense for lawyers and health-care professionals to pay "runners" to bring them clients.
In arguing the merits of jail time as a fitting punishment for Cohen yesterday, prosecutor Friedholm said the chiropractor engaged in conduct that "endangered the police personnel, the fire personnel and the emergency personnel" responding to phony crashes.
"Mr. Cohen was out there actively encouraging Mr. Pinales to stage automobile collisions ... engaging in staged accidents on public roads in Massachusetts," the prosecutor said.
Because of the involvement of professional people such as Cohen, "the hardworking residents of the city of Lawrence have been forced to pay a much higher insurance rate," Friedholm told the judge.
In the wake of the auto theft crackdown, 177 individuals have been charged with auto fraud in what is considered to be the largest fraud investigation of its kind in state history.
