“After months of waiting, the news of Samrat Mukherjee’s arrest is hopefully the start of the road to justice. I find comfort in knowing that something is being done and patients are safer as a result.” ~Anonymous UWK Source
BATON ROUGE — The paramedic who presented himself as a medical doctor, Samrat Mukherjee, was arrested today on three felony charges. His arrest follows numerous investigations by Unfiltered with Kiran into the former Acadian Ambulance employee, who allegedly posed as a doctor for nearly four years.
The Louisiana Bureau of Investigations arrested Mukherjee on July 31, charging him with government benefits fraud, forgery, and illegal transmission of monetary funds.
After UWK’s investigations, it was revealed that the FBI and possibly the DEA had launched their own investigations into Mukherjee’s alleged actions.
UWK Investigations
In December 2022, UWK found that Mukherjee was fired for fraudulently asserting himself as a doctor during his tenure at Acadian Ambulance. Mukherjee had been employed as a paramedic with Acadian since May 2015 until he was fired on December 9, 2022.
Multiple credible sources told UWK that Mukherjee had used a fellow doctor’s National Prescription Identifier number as his own. This allowed Mukherjee to call in prescriptions under the false identity of the doctor.
Treating a 3-year-old with a Skull Fracture
Madison Terrell’s disturbing account revealed how Mukherjee treated her 3-year-old daughter, Dallas. On October 20, 2022, the child suffered a skull fracture after falling off a golf cart in Grosse Tete. Mukherjee allegedly failed to provide proper medical attention, instructing the child to walk despite the severity of her injury, which medical experts believe could have caused further damage to her spine or skull.
“We were all just in shock really when we realized he wasn’t really a doctor,” Terrell stated. “If something more would have been wrong with her, then he wasn’t the one to make the call. He told us he was on the AirMed and whenever he heard it was a child injured, he flew from Lafayette to come to our house to make sure she was okay. He told us he was a doctor. He told us he was the attending physician. If you would have been talking to him in person, you would have thought he was a doctor with everything that he was saying. He actually did a physical exam on her to make sure she could still see, like the vision test.”
2014-2015 Misrepresentation that he was a medical student
Prior to his time at Acadian, Mukherjee had allegedly pretended to be a fourth-year medical student needing to shadow a doctor in Baton Rouge, according to credible anonymous sources.
Mukherjee shadowed a doctor at Lake After Hours Urgent Care around 2014-2015, claiming to be a medical student at Emory School of Medicine. However, Emory University School of Medicine confirmed that Mukherjee had applied to the program but was not accepted.
The investigation uncovered that Mukherjee lacked basic medical knowledge expected of a fourth-year medical student, leading to his dismissal from shadowing at the urgent care facility.
Mukherjee’s Arrest
The Louisiana Bureau of Investigation, the criminal investigative division of the Louisiana Department of Justice, initiated the investigation into Mukherjee for potential Medicaid fraud. He allegedly withheld income information related to his earnings from Acadian Ambulance, resulting in him receiving Medicaid benefits from December 2016 to October 2022.
During this period, Mukherjee failed to disclose his employment with Acadian and the substantial salary increases he received under his false doctor status. If he had accurately reported his income from Acadian during that time, he would have been ineligible for Medicaid benefits.
The arrest warrant states that Mukherjee fraudulently received $30,213.71 in Medicaid benefits claims from December 2018 to October 2022.
Additionally, in his four years of employment at Acadian, Mukherjee received a total of $226,974.34 in wages after falsely representing himself as a Doctor of Medicine from Tulane University School of Medicine.
Further investigation by UWK revealed that Mukherjee allegedly forged his own match letter for medical school.
On February 24, 2022, Acadian’s operations supervisor and human resources sent emails regarding Mukherjee’s need for a new ID that states he is a doctor. The email details that Mukherjee had some issues with access on a recent job, however, there were issues with a badge machine so the new badge wasn’t printed. Mukherjee sent a follow up email on April 4, 2022, asking the director of operations and the regional vice president if the ID could be formatted as “Dr. Samrat Mukherjee.” He included copies of two badges, one from Acadian and one from Baton Rouge General, where both badges had Mukherjee’s photograph and the title “Physician” and “MD,” respectively. This was substantiated by another Acadian representative in the LBI investigation.
The arrest warrant states that after learning this information, “…agents contacted University of Tulane administration and requested confirmation of Samrat Mukherjee’s medical degree. Officials conducted a thorough review and discovered that Tulane had no records that Mukherjee had ever received a medical degree.”
During the LBI investigation, Acadian representatives confirmed the circumstances leading to Mukherjee’s termination. They stated that had they known the medical degree was forged, they would have terminated him immediately.
In the course of the investigation, LBI discovered that Mukherjee had obtained a facility access badge for Baton Rouge General Medical Center under “false pretenses”. Although records indicated he was never employed by BRGMC, he had received facility access on January 2, 2019, listed as “Resident” with the preferred name “Dr. Mukherjee.”
Statement from Acadian Ambulance on today’s arrest:
Acadian Ambulance Service, Inc. applauds the arrest of Samrat Mukherjee and the
work of the law enforcement agencies who investigated this matter. Acadian and its
team members cooperated fully with authorities in the course of their investigation.
Prior to his termination, Samrat Mukherjee was employed with Acadian Ambulance
Service as a credentialed paramedic. All employees’ credentials are checked and
verified based on their employment status. Accordingly, Mr. Mukherjee’s credentials as
a licensed paramedic were verified annually.
Although, Mr. Mukherjee went to great lengths to fraudulently represent himself to his
peers, his coworkers and others in the healthcare community as a physician in training/
residency and sought to be recognized as such, Acadian never agreed to a change in
his employment status, duties, or authority, beyond that of a licensed paramedic. “At no
time was Mukherjee authorized or allowed to practice as a physician, and he was never
allowed to provide medical control or to act in any capacity other than as a credentialed
paramedic. Our medics are trained to follow protocols to access medical direction from
the company’s approved and named medical directors, of which Mukherjee has never
been listed or allowed to function as such,” said Acadian’s Chief Medical Officer Dr.
Charles Burnell.
To be clear, while in the course and scope of his employment with Acadian, Mr.
Mukherjee was never given the authority to perform any duties beyond the practice of a
paramedic. Any identification worn, or representation made, by Mr. Mukherjee to the
contrary was done so without the endorsement of Acadian and is yet another fraudulent
action for which he will be called to answer.
The choice of Mr. Mukherjee and the actions he took to deceive those he worked with
and others regarding his educational status are deplorable. With today’s arrest, we are
confident that he will be brought to justice for the decisions he made.
Please direct any inquiries to Randall Mann (RMann@Acadian.com)
Unfiltered with Kiran reached out to the U.S. Attorney’s Office at the Middle District but no response has been received at the time of this report.
Awesome reporting. That’s the way it’s done!