U.S. District Judge Sharon Coleman denied a motion July 16 by Anosh Ahmed, MD, former CFO and COO of Chicago-based Loretto Hospital, to join his co-defendants in seeking dismissal in a COVID-19 testing fraud case.
Federal prosecutors filed an emergency motion June 11 in the case to dismiss an indictment with prejudice against Mahmood Khan and Suhaib Chaudhry, who were employees of a Houston-area company that Dr. Ahmed created after he resigned from Loretto Hospital.
Ms. Coleman said in a memorandum opinion, obtained by Becker’s, that Dr. Ahmed qualifies as a “constructive” or “functional” fugitive under the fugitive disentitlement doctrine, which lets courts decline to hear motions from defendants who avoid the judicial process.
Dr. Ahmed was arrested Nov. 30, 2025, in Belgrade, Serbia. He remains in Serbian custody and contests U.S. extradition.
The June 2025 original indictment alleged that Dr. Ahmed and co-defendants submitted roughly $894 million in false COVID-19 testing claims, which resulted in approximately $293 million in fraudulent payments. Dr. Ahmed is also facing a separate case tied to his time as Loretto Hospital COO and CFO from Dec. 2017 to March 2021.
“No relief, including access to sealed discovery, will be granted unless and until [Dr. Ahmed] is arraigned, in-person, before this court,” the document said. “If [Dr. Ahmed] submits to the court’s jurisdiction, he is given leave to renew his Motion to Dismiss the Indictment on prosecutorial misconduct grounds.”
