Oakland County woman faces 16 counts of unauthorized practice of a health profession

LANSING — An Oakland County woman accused of posing as a board-certified therapist at the Oxford Recovery Center in Brighton will stand trial on numerous charges for the unauthorized practice of a health profession, identify theft and witness intimidation, Attorney General Dana Nessel announced Thursday.

Kimberly Casey Coden-Diskin was bound over for trial following a partial preliminary examination Jan. 18 and Feb. 1, before Judge Shauna Murphy in 53rd District Court in Howell.

Coden-Diskin was charged in August with 16 counts of unauthorized practice of a health profession, four-year felonies that include a $5,000 fine; and two counts of identity theft, five-year felonies with a $25,000 fine. She was released on a $50,000 personal recognizance bond.

In August, her lawyer, Jerime Sabbota, said: "The truth is, it's like anything else. You can throw dirt on somebody and say, 'Now defend yourself,' which she's going to do."

Sabbota did not respond to a message left Thursday.

Tami Peterson, founder and CEO of the Oxford Recovery Center, said Coden-Diskin worked an administrative job and the Attorney General's charges either happened before she was hired at the Oxford Recovery Center or are untrue.

"She never was hired as a BCBA. She never acted as a BCBA. She was an administrator. Anything that they're charging her for is prior to her being at my company," Peterson said. "We have a tremendous amount of evidence to show that these are lies."

She said the case has hurt her company and gotten in the way of her being able to do her job: taking care of kids.

"It keeps harming my company and harming me from taking care of kids," she said. "There's no evidence at all … it's witch hunt."

In addition to the original counts, Coden-Diskin was charged in December with one count of witnesses-bribing/intimidating/interfering intimidation for alleged communications with a witness. Coden-Diskin waived her right to a preliminary exam on that charge. She was released on a $25,000 cash/surety bond.

The Attorney General's Office alleges that Coden-Diskin falsely represented herself as a board-certified behavioral analyst and used false credentials to treat children diagnosed with autism and work with their parents.

According to a press release from the Attorney General's Office, in 2018, Coden-Diskin obtained employment at the Oxford Recovery Center in Brighton, where she performed services that required a license and certification she did not have.

Further, Coden-Diskin was never licensed by the state of Michigan as required under the Michigan Public Health Code. The Attorney General's Office says she used professional business cards, verbal statements and written documents to pose as a licensed medical professional. She presented university degrees that she is alleged not to have earned and utilized the certification number of another state certified individual to conceal her lack of certification.

“Regrettably, employers can’t always rely upon what an applicant may represent to them. In many cases, due diligence requires verification of legally necessary qualifications,” Nessel said in the release. “When circumstances arise that someone misrepresents themselves as a medical professional, my office stands ready to intervene.”

Coden-Diskin's pre-trial conference in 44th Circuit Court has not yet been set.

The Attorney General’s Health Care Fraud Division handled the case for the Department. The HCFD is the federally certified Medicaid Fraud Control Unit for Michigan.

This article originally appeared on Livingston Daily: Oakland County woman charged with faking health care license