Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel announced Wednesday Oakland County woman accused of posing as a board-certified therapist at the Oxford Recovery Center in Brighton has been arraigned.
Kimberly Casey Coden-Diskin, 34, was arraigned in Livingston County’s 53 District Court on sixteen counts of unauthorized practice of a health profession, a felony which carries a possible $5,000 fine and four-year sentence; and two counts of identity theft, a felony that carries a $25,000 fine and five-year sentence. The Department of Attorney General alleges that Coden-Diskin obtained employment in 2018 at the Oxford Recovery Center in Brighton.
During her employment at the facility, Coden-Diskin repeatedly represented herself as a Board-Certified Behavioral Analyst (BCBA) despite her lack of required certification by the Behavior Analyst Certification Board (BACB). In addition, Coden-Diskin was never licensed by the State of Michigan as required under the Michigan Public Health Code. Coden-Diskin continuously presented herself as a certified and licensed BCBA through professional business cards, verbal statements, and written documents.
It is alleged she engaged in job duties which required such a certification and license while working with a highly vulnerable population of children diagnosed with Autism as well as the parents of the child patients. In addition, Coden-Diskin allegedly utilized the BACB certification number of another state certified individual to fraudulently manufacture a BACB certificate under her own identity to continue to present herself as a legitimate BCBA.
“People who impersonate credentialed medical staff in order to treat children create the potential for great harm,” said Nessel. “I will not tolerate those who put children at risk and will prosecute those that do to the fullest extent of the law.”
The Attorney General’s Health Care Fraud Division (HCFD) handled this case for the Department. The HCFD is the federally certified Medicaid Fraud Control Unit for Michigan, and it receives 75% of its funding from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services under a grant award totaling $4,846,440 for the fiscal year 2022. The remaining 25% percent, totaling $1,615,478, is funded by the State of Michigan.
A probable cause conference is scheduled for August 23 and a preliminary examination is scheduled for August 30.
