Feds charge medical testing company with fraud

A federal grand jury has charged the uBiome co-founders with multiple federal crimes, including two fraud charges, money laundering and more.

Now bankrupt, uBiome was founded by Zachary Apte, 36, and Jessica Richman, 46, in 2012 as a medical testing company that performed diagnostic analysis on fecal samples.

The company offered a direct-to-consumer service called “Gut Explorer,” which allowed an individual to submit a fecal sample to be analyzed by uBiome in its laboratory, after which the company would produce a report comparing the customer’s microbiome to the microbiomes of others who submitted samples. All the analysis and reporting was priced at less than $100 for the consumer.

Apte and Richman were charged with conspiracy to commit securities fraud, conspiracy to commit health care fraud, money laundering and related offenses connected to their alleged schemes to defraud health insurance providers and investors to raise capital f…

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