The View co-host Sunny Hostin’s surgeon husband Emmanuel accused of insurance fraud in bombshell lawsuit

The longtime husband of The View co-host Sunny Hostin is starting the new year under a cloud after being charged with federal insurance fraud.

Orthopedic surgeon Dr. Emmanuel “Manny” Hostin is among nearly 200 defendants named in one of the largest RICO cases ever filed in New York.

He and many of the others are accused of receiving kickbacks by running an operation and fraudulently billing a company that insures taxi companies and Uber and Lyft drivers.

“Hostin knowingly provided fraudulent medical and other health care services, including arthroscopic surgeries,” alleges the lawsuit, which was filed on December 17.

The insurance company American Transit was then billed “in exchange for kickbacks and/or other compensation disguised as dividends or other cash payments.”

Hostin’s lawyer Daniel Thwaites told DailyMail.com that his client “denies every allegation” and called the lawsuit a “generic, scattershot, worthless lawsuit from a nearly bankrupt insurance company.”

“It is intended to intimidate and harass physicians in collecting care for American Transit policyholders and their passengers,” Thwaites said.

He said Hostin has an “impeccable” record, adding, “American Transit rushed into the lawsuit without ever investigating Dr. Hostin or expressed any concerns to his lawyers.

“The real story here is about an insurance company abusing the legal system to limit health care benefits for its policyholders and their passengers and write off its own liabilities,” Thwaites said.

Sunny Hostin, 56, has been married to the doctor for almost a quarter of a century. They tied the knot in 1998, have two children and live in a palatial 10-bed, 10-bathroom estate in Purchase, New York.

They met at a church in Maryland, where he graduated from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in 1996.

Sunny, an attorney and former prosecutor, is a senior legal correspondent and analyst for ABC News and co-host of The View.

She is no stranger to talking about her marriage on The View. In February, co-host Whoopi labeled her a ‘b****’ when Hostin openly criticized her husband’s cooking live on air.

She has also shared painful experiences, including her struggles with infertility, before she and her husband welcomed their children, a 22-year-old son and 18-year-old daughter.

In January 2021, she revealed the tragic news that her husband’s parents, both doctors, had died of COVID over the holidays.

The lawsuit filed in federal court in Brooklyn charges Dr. Hostin, 54, listed as the owner of Hostin Orthopedics, which operates from an eighth-floor office on Lexington Avenue, near Manhattan’s Grand Central Terminal.

American Transit claims that “rampant” insurance fraud is endemic in New York State thanks to the “No-Fault Law,” which requires insurers to pay up to $50,000 for medical costs for people injured in traffic accidents.

“These substantial potential no-fault recoveries could encourage malicious providers to over-diagnose, over-treat and over-bille in order to recover the most money for themselves,” American Transit said in a statement.

The law was introduced in 1974 “in the wake of rapidly rising auto insurance costs and when accident victims experienced long delays in receiving compensation,” American Transit says in the lawsuit.

But taxis and car-sharing companies now have to pay up to $200,000 – four times the cover for private drivers.

‘This has put a target on the back of livery vehicles and the insurance companies that insure them for unsavory people looking to benefit from injury payouts.’

“In total, those who abuse the No-Fault Law have amassed hundreds of millions in fraudulent payments, destabilized the livery insurance market in New York City, increased premiums for hard-working taxi and livery drivers, and harmed the public.”

American Transit is seeking more than $450 million in damages in this case.

The insurance company claims that Hostin received an “investment interest” in the Empire State Ambulatory Surgery Center in exchange for referring a “steady stream” of patients.

“Empire State ASC regularly made payments to or on behalf of Hostin, which were in effect illegal kickbacks for referrals,” the court papers allege.

As an example, the insurance company claims that in January 2023, Hostin – who is affiliated with several top hospitals in New York, including Mount Sinai and Lenox Hill – saw two patients involved in ‘low-impact’ collisions that had ‘no more than gentle’ collisions should cause. tissue damage’.

But in both cases, Hostin allegedly performed arthroscopic surgery within two months without seeing whether the patients would have recovered with more conservative care.

William Natbony, an attorney for American Transit, told DailyMail.com “Fault without fault is a big problem in New York.

“American Transit has filed a lawsuit as part of its legal responsibility to combat such fraud.

But Steven Harfenist, an attorney who has represented defendants in similar cases, told Law.com that the lawsuit “seems like a Hail Mary” from American Transit.

He called it a desperate attempt to “wipe out large swathes of accounts receivable” by targeting smaller practices that might settle because they can’t afford lawsuits.