Florida Serenity Ranch Recovery CEO Convicted

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Following a six-week trial, the Serenity Ranch Recovery network CEO, Sebastian Ahmed, was sentenced to more than 17 years in prison. After a trial that lasted over a month, a federal court in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, convicted him of several crimes, including health care fraud and money laundering.

Fraud in the Serenity Ranch Network

While the people who came to him needed help for drug or alcohol addiction, the services provided by Serenity Ranch Recovery weren’t meant to keep them sober. The sober home network, like many others in recent years, was a moneymaking venture. Patients tended to be young, addicted adults who were still on their parent’s health plans. They were typically addicted to “hard” drugs such as Oxycontin or heroin.

Rather than receiving treatment, most young people were left to languish with a few 12-step meetings and little else. While this took place, Mr. Ahmed billed the …

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WA Addresses Post-Treatment Homelessness

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Homelessness has always been an issue for people new to recovery. After all, it usually takes hitting bottom for a person to seek recovery options. While recovery is still possible, and many treatment centers still offer services, there are more challenges for people seeking recovery than ever. One major problem that people face when they leave treatment is finding a place to live. For so many recovering addicts, finances are tight or nonexistent, and possessions are lost entirely or are in storage. While Medicaid can usually pay for drug treatment, there is a fear of homelessness upon completion of programs.

In Washington state, during the height of the pandemic, they are rushing to close this gap and help people in recovery stay drug and alcohol-free in a space of their own. Thousands of young people with addiction and mental health issues are left homeless every year after completing programs.…

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Grant Awarded to Create, Upgrade Much-Needed Sober Housing in Mass.

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In Massachusetts, in some ways, they are catching up to the opioid epidemic and facing it head-on. This sometimes means sending addicted patients home with medication-assisted treatment, offering sober coaching programs, and even providing drop-in clinics in some cities where drug addiction therapy is scarce. Now, The Center for Community Recovery Innovations (CCRI) has awarded a total of $696,995 in grant funding to help house recovery populations that include men, women, families, veterans, the homeless and ex-offenders.

The money will go to creating and modernizing 118 affordable sober housing units in communities across Massachusetts.

The grants come from the Center for Community Recovery Innovations, Inc. (CCRI), a nonprofit subsidiary of MassHousing. The goal of the award is to help nonprofits create or preserve affordable sober housing in Massachusetts.

This is not the first grant that has been awarded to support substance-free housing. Total, CCRI has awarded more than $10 …

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