0:00

In 2010, the largest oil

0:02

spill in American history captivated

0:04

the public's attention. Authorities

0:07

told a story of a response effort

0:09

that prevented a worst-case scenario. But

0:11

if you ask some people who lived through

0:14

the spill, they'll tell you a more complicated

0:17

story. They weren't attending to the workers. I

0:19

was bleeding from everywhere. We

0:21

were all lied to. From

0:23

Western Sound and APM Studios

0:25

comes a new investigative podcast,

0:28

Ripple. From

0:31

the Center for Investigative Reporting and

0:33

PRX, this is Reveal. I'm

0:36

Al Letton. In

0:38

March 2022, New Hampshire Public Radio

0:41

broke a big story. It

0:43

was about the founder and then CEO

0:45

of New Hampshire's largest addiction treatment network.

0:48

I'm about as well known as a

0:50

drug addict. What a weird claim

0:52

to fame. I'm a very well-known drug addict in this

0:54

state. Eric Spofford built

0:56

his business on his own story

0:58

of substance use disorder and recovery.

1:01

New Hampshire was hit hard by

1:03

the opioid epidemic, and he'd become

1:05

an influential figure in the state's

1:07

response to the crisis. Governor

1:10

Chris Sununu considered Spofford one of

1:12

his go-to guys, and Spofford

1:14

testified before Congress. But

1:17

then, reporter Lauren Chulgin had

1:19

uncovered that Spofford was accused

1:21

of multiple acts of sexual

1:24

misconduct by employees and former

1:26

clients. All these allegations

1:28

raise serious questions about Spofford's leadership,

1:30

the company that made him wealthy,

1:33

and New Hampshire's reliance on Spofford to

1:35

help address the addiction crisis. For

1:38

her story, Lauren spoke to victims

1:40

at one of Spofford's facilities called

1:42

Green Mountain Treatment Center, including

1:44

a woman named Elizabeth. The

1:47

day after she left Green Mountain, she

1:50

says she started receiving messages

1:52

on Snapchat from Eric Spofford.

1:55

He was already planning to come to see me, wanted

1:58

to take me out. wanted

2:00

to do explicit things. She

2:03

also spoke with people on his staff. I

2:05

went into this knowing fully well

2:07

that he had liabilities.

2:11

I certainly didn't know that he

2:14

was gonna turn out to be like

2:16

Harvey Weinstein. After

2:18

the story airs, Lauren continues

2:20

reporting and she gets a call from

2:22

a woman we're calling Andrea. We're

2:25

not using her real name because other people

2:27

who've spoken out have faced threats. Andrea's

2:30

in recovery. She tells

2:33

Lauren she'd met Spofford at an

2:35

Alcoholics Anonymous meeting and that

2:37

he'd taken advantage of her too. I

2:39

fell right into it, right into

2:41

it. You know, it's like, it's just,

2:44

you're so vulnerable. But then

2:46

she says this kind of behavior, it's

2:49

much bigger than just one man. It's

2:51

so common there's even a name for

2:53

it. It's because it's so notorious and it's so

2:55

bad and what they, you know, there's like this thing

2:57

called the 12 steps. Well,

3:00

what they do, they made a joke about being a 13 stepper. And

3:05

the 13 stepper is like, will

3:09

you take advantage of a

3:11

newcomer? Like they joke like don't be

3:13

a 13 stepper or something.

3:15

So it's like, it's very prevalent but

3:18

he really had it down to a science. Today,

3:24

we're bringing you part of a podcast from Lauren

3:27

and her team in New Hampshire Public Radio. It's

3:29

called the 13th step. In

3:32

this series, Lauren goes deep on

3:35

this long standing culture of sexual

3:37

misconduct in recovery communities. And

3:39

a heads up, parts of today's story may

3:42

be difficult for some listeners to hear. Lauren

3:45

Chilgens joins me now. Hey Lauren. Hey

3:48

Al. So after your story

3:50

goes out about Eric Spofford in

3:52

March, 2022, he denies those allegations.

3:55

What happens next? Well, a

3:57

lot. So we were.

4:00

sued by Spofford for defamation

4:02

and in fact he sued us six

4:04

months after the story came out. He

4:07

sued myself, two of my colleagues, and

4:09

so NHPR where we work, but also

4:11

three of my sources which was particularly

4:14

difficult for them. And so it's

4:16

been, you know, a pretty dark shadow

4:19

over the reporting process is really complicated

4:21

things, but happy to

4:23

report that recently we got some good

4:25

news from the judge in the case

4:27

who basically said that Eric has no

4:29

basis for a defamation suit against us,

4:31

but we're still now waiting to see

4:33

if Eric will appeal. Yeah,

4:35

so I've been following this case a little bit

4:37

and I mean obviously as

4:40

a reporter working on a story about

4:42

powerful people, you don't want to be

4:44

sued, but it is definitely a thing

4:46

that happens. But what is

4:49

not expected is personal

4:52

attacks that come to your home. Can

4:54

you tell me about that? Like what

4:56

exactly happened? Yeah, so unfortunately a couple

4:59

months, it was a month actually after

5:01

the first story came out, there

5:04

was pretty violent vandalism, the seaward

5:06

spray-painted on doors, and bricks and rocks

5:08

thrown through windows at my parents house,

5:10

a house I used to live in,

5:13

and our news director's house. And then

5:15

a month after that they

5:17

figured out where I live and through

5:20

a brick through my window and spray-painted

5:22

just the beginning under the broken window

5:24

and also hit my parents house again.

5:26

So that was pretty

5:28

terrifying to say the least. Yeah. And

5:30

yeah, it's been a lot. In

5:33

the year plus since that happened,

5:35

federal prosecutors have actually charged four

5:38

men for their roles in the vandalism, including

5:40

a guy that is really close friends

5:42

with Eric Spofford, the guy that we

5:44

investigated. And you know the

5:47

whole thing about intimidation tactics when people

5:49

pull them out is that a

5:51

lot of times they work. Yeah, they do.

5:53

Like people get scared. I mean it is

5:55

scary, a brick coming through your house where

5:57

you live with your child and your husband.

6:00

attacks on your parents house. I'm

6:03

curious like how did this affect your sources? Yeah

6:05

so that's the thing is that you know it's

6:07

one thing that it's hard for me as a

6:09

person I can manage that but for my sources

6:12

it was just it was terrible and and you

6:14

know I had people drop out when they saw

6:16

what happened and one person in particular told me

6:18

like you can't protect me and that it was

6:20

just horrifying to hear because you know what she was right

6:23

and so I respected any decision

6:25

any source had to make but

6:28

it also really made me feel like for those who

6:30

are willing to stick with the story you know there

6:32

was no choice other than just to continue doing the

6:34

reporting. Yeah so

6:36

you weren't looking for answers about how

6:38

to hold people accountable for unethical behavior

6:41

in recovery communities what'd you

6:43

find? Well it's not an easy

6:45

answer I can tell you that much I mean

6:47

it really depends on a bunch of different factors

6:49

you know it depends what state the facility is

6:52

in it depends on the kind of

6:54

person at the place doing the harm

6:56

you know for example you can open a

6:58

treatment center in many states without having any

7:00

sort of professional license or any sort of

7:02

master's degree or anything like that that's just

7:04

how it is in many states and so

7:06

if the person doing the harm isn't licensed

7:08

you don't have anyone to report them to

7:11

and even in states where there are

7:13

tighter restrictions and they you know maybe

7:15

would ask for accreditation of a facility those

7:18

accrediting organizations aren't coming around all the

7:20

time and so the likelihood that they

7:22

may be able to catch something while

7:25

it's happening that's very low and then

7:27

the final factor here in what makes all

7:29

this very complicated is not only is there

7:32

not enough oversight but we're really putting a

7:34

lot of onus on people who are in

7:36

really vulnerable positions to come forward I mean

7:38

and oftentimes people with active addiction

7:40

they're not going to go to the police you know

7:42

because for a long time the drug that they were

7:44

using is considered illegal and the police don't often lead

7:47

to help in many cases right and so the idea

7:49

that they would call the police is probably not going

7:51

to happen and the idea that they would know who

7:53

to go to in a facility especially if it's someone

7:56

in a position of power at that facility

7:58

there's just no pathways it seems that are

8:00

actually going to lead to accountability. Yeah.

8:03

And so that brings us to the story we're going

8:06

to hear today. It's about another

8:08

case, but this one is in California

8:10

where the CEO of a network of

8:12

treatment facilities was accused of sexual assault

8:15

and massive insurance fraud. And

8:17

you tell the story of two women who

8:19

go after this guy. What did

8:21

you learn from Rose and Debbie? Okay, this

8:23

story is wild, just so you know. This story

8:25

is so wild because Rose and Debbie taught me

8:27

that you literally cannot give up if you want

8:29

to find accountability in this industry. If

8:31

you want to catch a predator, you better like

8:33

clear your calendar because it's going to be years

8:36

of your time, as Rose and Debbie taught me.

8:38

You're going to have to push through all kinds

8:40

of bureaucracy. And you know, even

8:42

if you're Debbie and you used to be a

8:44

federal prosecutor, as you'll hear, she couldn't even get

8:46

law enforcement's attention for a long time. So

8:48

you have to be dedicated. You have to

8:50

really advocate for people and you can't give

8:53

up. Thanks Lauren. Thank

8:56

you so much. Lauren

8:58

Chiljian is an investigative reporter at New Hampshire

9:01

Public Radio and the host of the 13th

9:03

Step. Our story

9:05

was produced by Najeeb Amini. When

9:09

we come back, a worker at

9:11

a recovery center hears rumors about

9:13

her boss offering drugs to patients.

9:16

And at that point it was like,

9:18

what? It was

9:20

so, I mean, I really had kind

9:22

of a little mini nervous breakdown. You're

9:25

listening to Reveal. The

9:37

history of HIV and AIDS is the history

9:39

of people who were told to stay out

9:41

of sight and who refused. Gay

9:44

men, but also injection drug users,

9:46

women, and yes, children who contracted

9:48

the virus. Join us

9:51

for the series, Blind Spot, The Plague and

9:53

the Shadows. How much pain

9:55

could have been avoided had we paid

9:57

attention sooner and what lessons could be.

10:00

we have learned from History Channel

10:02

and WNYC Studios. Listen wherever you

10:04

get podcasts. From

10:07

the Center for Investigative Reporting and

10:09

PRX, this is Reveal. I'm

10:11

Al Letzen. Today, we're bringing

10:13

you part of a series from New

10:16

Hampshire Public Radio called The Thirteenth Step.

10:19

It's about a culture of sexual

10:21

misconduct in the addiction treatment industry.

10:24

Most of the series is about how hard it

10:26

is to root out that misconduct. But

10:29

this story is about two women who team up

10:31

to do just that. Their

10:33

names are Debbie Herzog and Rose

10:35

Stahl. Here's reporter

10:37

Lauren Chiljian. In

10:42

2013, Rose was living in Los Angeles

10:45

and she was talking to a friend about how

10:47

she was thinking about drinking again. Rose

10:50

had been in recovery for a while at

10:52

that point and his friend was like, oh,

10:54

you should meet this guy, Chris Bassam. He's

10:57

a therapist, this friend said. He specializes in

10:59

addiction and he might take you for free.

11:03

Free sounded especially great. So

11:05

Rose started seeing Bassam for weekly therapy

11:07

sessions. What was he like? It's

11:13

funny, it's hard for me to answer that

11:15

question straight out without saying I am fully

11:17

aware that many, many other people saw right

11:19

through him right away. But for

11:21

me, he was

11:23

just really brilliant and I

11:27

always walked away every session just

11:30

feeling this sense of ease. Okay,

11:33

okay. Everything's okay.

11:36

I met Rose at her home in Austin, Texas.

11:38

That's where she lives now. I

11:41

was immediately struck by how vibrant and

11:43

expressive Rose is. She beams

11:45

this happy, chaotic energy. I was barely out

11:47

of the car when she hugged me. But

11:51

like so many of us, Rose also

11:53

knows the depths of depression. She

11:56

was in a real tough spot when she met Bassam.

12:00

from her husband, trying to find her way

12:02

through the world as a single mom without

12:04

any family close by, no job, and

12:07

there were all those swirling questions about

12:09

her sobriety. But

12:11

she says her sessions with Batham

12:13

felt powerful and thoughtful. She

12:16

bonded with him quickly. So

12:18

for over a year, she'd drive to

12:20

his office for an hour or 90-minute

12:22

session and walk out feeling relieved. So

12:26

sometimes, sometimes he did

12:28

say things that Rose thought, whoa,

12:30

what? He did offer

12:33

eventually to drink with me in a

12:36

bar as a therapeutic tool

12:38

to assess my, am

12:40

I an alcoholic or not? A

12:42

therapeutic tool. Drinking

12:44

with her therapist. Rose

12:47

says it instantly made her feel nauseous.

12:50

She didn't take him up on it, but she heard

12:52

him out. Because Batham

12:54

wasn't only a therapist. He was

12:56

the founder of a growing substance

12:58

use disorder treatment company called Community

13:00

Recovery Los Angeles. He

13:02

ran facilities in many of the fanciest

13:04

corners of L.A., like Malibu and Calabasas,

13:07

home of at least one Kardashian. Batham

13:10

would eventually own more than 20

13:12

sober homes and outpatient clinics in

13:15

Colorado and California, so surely

13:17

he must know what he's talking about.

13:19

But it was also, in a way, Batham

13:22

was great for Los Angeles because Los

13:25

Angeles is full of those moments all

13:28

the time. You're like, whoa, what? Who

13:30

did what? That moment

13:32

could have been a bright red flag. She

13:35

could have walked away, found a new therapist. But

13:38

of course, that is so hard to do.

13:41

Instead, Rose would end up

13:43

working at Community Recovery,

13:45

Batham's treatment company. They

13:48

call it CRLA, and most people refer

13:50

to Chris Batham as Batham, so I

13:52

will too. Batham

13:54

offered Rose a job at CRLA

13:56

during one of their therapy sessions.

14:00

definitely knew that was weird, but

14:02

Batham convinced her they'd keep their distance

14:04

from each other and stop doing therapy together.

14:07

Plus, CRLA was growing

14:09

rapidly. It seemed on the outside like

14:11

a place you wanted to be a part of if

14:14

you cared about addiction. Batham

14:16

was seen as a visionary, a guy

14:18

who was always talking about systems and

14:20

theories. It felt like he

14:22

was thinking differently about this seemingly unsolvable

14:25

problem of addiction. So

14:27

you really think that rehabs fraud? For the most

14:29

part, I'd say that's the case. I

14:31

wouldn't say that's always the case. But

14:33

I think that most of the work that's being

14:35

done and the money that's being spent is wasted.

14:38

This is an old radio interview

14:40

Batham did before opening CRLA, where

14:42

he's calling out other treatment providers.

14:45

They very much are focusing on the next client

14:47

and the next client's cash and how the

14:49

next client's cash is going to make the

14:51

thing better. And it's very much like a

14:53

person who's selling something in addiction in that

14:55

selling process or a person who's gambling and

14:58

anything goes as long as the client comes in. And

15:01

I think that's pretty sick. CRLA

15:04

was all built around Batham's big idea

15:06

that the best way to solve substance

15:08

use disorder is with more affordable,

15:10

longer term treatment. He

15:13

was also known for his holistic approach to treatment,

15:16

like using sound baths or meditation

15:18

sessions in sweat lodges. And

15:20

there are still people who say that

15:23

CRLA was the thing that finally helped

15:25

them stop using. Batham

15:28

felt like the usual 30 days of rehab

15:30

weren't enough. So he'd keep clients for

15:32

90 days of inpatient treatment. He

15:34

didn't invent that, by the way. Longer

15:36

residential treatment is an idea that's been around

15:38

for a long time. Batham

15:41

even found ways to keep clients after their

15:43

90 days. He would

15:46

offer clients paid internships, quote unquote,

15:48

where they do odd jobs and

15:50

chores at CRLA. And

15:52

then after only six months of interning,

15:54

clients could be hired as CRLA

15:57

staff. Batham hired

15:59

Rose to help open a new community

16:01

center, which would be the main hub of

16:03

CRLA. And given how

16:06

tumultuous her life had been lately, this

16:08

new job felt like a fresh start. I

16:11

was making decent money, you know, it was enough

16:13

for me to support myself and my daughter with

16:15

the help of like a little bit of child

16:17

support. So it was awesome,

16:19

actually, I was self-sufficient. I

16:22

didn't have, you know, any worries. Rose

16:25

could tell pretty quickly that CRLA was

16:27

expanding. One

16:29

minute she's working on the new community center,

16:31

and then the next she's talking with a

16:33

contractor about a new medical clinic. At

16:36

the time, Rose had no idea

16:38

how CRLA was funded. She didn't think much

16:40

about it. But in

16:43

a small office, 35 miles away, a

16:45

woman named Debbie Herzog was starting to

16:47

get an idea. So

16:50

is it better if we sit next to each

16:52

other? We can do that. Do that?

16:55

It's just fine. Yeah. She's

16:57

been a federal prosecutor for nearly two

16:59

decades. It's a key part of who she

17:01

is, despite many of the other

17:03

prestigious jobs on her resume. For

17:06

example, she also investigated fraud

17:08

for some federal agencies like NASA

17:11

and the Postal Service. So

17:13

suffice it to say, not much

17:15

gets by Debbie Herzog. In

17:18

2013, as Rose was in therapy with

17:21

BATHAM, Debbie left government work

17:23

and started a job as an

17:25

insurance investigator at Anthem. It

17:27

was a lot of bill collecting, way more than she

17:29

had hoped. But then one day,

17:31

she ran out of assigned work to do. And

17:34

when that happens, we're supposed to try to come up

17:36

with our own. And the best way to do that

17:38

is to pick a certain procedure, a

17:40

certain billing code, and

17:42

run it through the computer,

17:45

and ask the computer

17:48

to find the providers that build

17:50

that code the most, and see

17:52

what pops up. So Debbie

17:54

thought, why don't I try the code for

17:56

preventative medicine? That covers things

17:58

like a primary care doctor sharing information

18:01

on how to prevent a heart attack or

18:03

things to avoid so you don't get

18:06

cancer. So I stuck preventive

18:08

medicine in and community recovery popped

18:10

up at the top of the

18:12

list and had hundreds

18:14

and hundreds and hundreds more

18:18

billings than any other provider

18:20

on the list. And it's

18:23

a drug and rehab center. Why are they

18:25

billing for preventive medicine? Hundreds

18:28

and hundreds and hundreds of

18:30

billings at CRLA.

18:33

Debbie realizes she might

18:38

be on to something here. So

18:41

I started looking at the

18:43

patients that Anthem Blue Cross

18:47

had at community recovery and I

18:49

could pull up the patients and

18:51

see the different things that they

18:54

were billed for and it was

18:56

just all kinds of stuff. Smoking

18:59

cessation, group therapy,

19:02

individual therapy, all kinds of

19:04

services that actually should

19:06

have been covered under

19:08

the umbrella of

19:11

drug treatment. So if you check

19:13

into a treatment center, they tell

19:15

you it's going to cost $30,000

19:18

a month and that $30,000 is going to cover all services at

19:24

that facility. So

19:26

if those services are being

19:28

billed individually as well,

19:30

that's double billing and

19:33

that's fraud.

19:36

Basically patients were being billed once

19:38

for all their treatment and then

19:40

billed again and again and again

19:42

and again for each individual

19:44

service which they'd already paid for. Debbie

19:48

starts digging hard. She

19:50

tries to drill down to see just

19:52

how deep this problem goes. Turns

19:55

out there was much more than

19:57

just the double billing scheme. Chris

20:00

Batham the guy who owned community recovery

20:02

it opened up places in Colorado

20:04

pretty recently and I

20:07

discovered looking at these individual patient billings

20:09

that some of them were being billed

20:13

for services rendered in Southern

20:16

California and Colorado on the same

20:18

day That's not

20:20

possible, right? so there

20:23

was triple billing and Then

20:26

I started running these

20:28

patients through social media to see

20:30

what I could find out about them and on

20:33

Facebook and on LinkedIn they

20:36

listed their jobs as Jobs

20:40

at community recovery. So he

20:42

was billing

20:44

for interns billing for full-time

20:46

employees Billing

20:48

for part-time employees as

20:51

if they were all patients Chris

20:53

Batham was taking out insurance policies

20:56

in the names of his employees

20:58

as in Creating accounts

21:00

for them and then billing those

21:02

fraudulent accounts for addiction treatment

21:04

services that no one was

21:06

actually receiving And

21:09

to add another layer it was

21:11

sometimes former clients hired to work

21:13

in the CRLA billing department Who

21:15

did that paperwork? What

21:17

it feel like to see that? Wow

21:22

I found not just paper

21:24

fraud, you know, it's kind of

21:27

a dull case paper fraud, but really

21:29

interesting Fraud, I mean

21:31

fraud that might get somebody's attention Or

21:35

so she hoped What

21:37

did you know about the recovery world at that point?

21:42

Unfortunately More

21:45

than one might expect

21:47

I had a son who was in recovery

21:49

at the time I had just Sent

21:52

him away for the

21:54

first time for treatment and was

21:58

well aware of the

22:01

expense, the billing, what services were

22:03

provided, and the

22:05

longer he was in and

22:07

out of recovery the more I got to know. So in

22:11

2014, while she sat in her new office,

22:14

clicking through fraudulent billing after

22:16

fraudulent billing by CRLA, an

22:18

addiction treatment provider, all

22:21

she could think of was David. I

22:27

mean I'm thinking this could be me, this

22:29

could be my kid who's

22:32

supposed to be getting services

22:34

that he's not getting. Yeah,

22:36

I was completely on my mind

22:39

and I think that's why I was so

22:41

rabid about the whole case and

22:43

and still am about the whole

22:45

industry. Rose

22:57

didn't stumble on a goldmine of data

22:59

like Debbie did. She was

23:01

on a different journey. She was close with

23:03

Batham. She was working for him, but

23:06

then she started to hear some

23:08

rumors. This is

23:11

the part of the story where we will start

23:13

to talk about things that are especially hard to

23:15

hear. The

23:17

rumor was that Batham was having

23:20

sex with female clients and

23:22

that he was using drugs with those clients. There

23:25

was also word going around of some

23:27

fraud that Batham had defrauded a former

23:29

investor. And at that

23:31

point it was like, what? It was

23:35

so, I mean I really had

23:37

kind of a little mini nervous

23:39

breakdown. There are a lot of choices

23:41

you can make when you hear such a wild

23:43

rumor. You could dismiss it, shrug

23:46

it off. You might spread it around, see

23:48

what other people say, or you

23:50

could be like Rose and think,

23:52

I need to confront Chris Batham

23:54

about this right now. Oh, it

23:58

wasn't an option not to. to. That

24:01

like, that's just kind of me. I

24:03

mean, there was no freaking way I

24:06

could not investigate and find out. Rose

24:09

told me she's always been like this.

24:11

She has to intervene. She's a rule

24:13

follower to the extreme. Her mom once

24:15

told her you've always been a little

24:18

whistleblower. There was one

24:20

story she told me that I'm potentially obsessed

24:22

with. Rose was six, maybe

24:24

seven, and she has a vivid

24:26

memory of being deeply disturbed by

24:28

other kids littering. I remember

24:33

being like the litter police,

24:35

you know, like some

24:37

kids were littering and we had this commercial

24:39

of like, don't mess with Texas. And I

24:41

was just, remember being like, don't mess with

24:43

Texas. Rose was

24:45

not the kid that pretends they don't see the

24:47

ice cream wrappers on the ground. Rose

24:50

was the kid that yelled out, hey, you can't do

24:52

that. I think they like

24:54

kicked me or something, you know, like, shut up,

24:56

you twerp. The

25:01

litter police thing never left her. So

25:05

when rumors were spreading that Chris Batham

25:07

was having sex with clients and using

25:09

drugs with them, the biggest question

25:11

for Rose was what's the best way to

25:13

confront him? Rose

25:15

had a friend named Jane who was living with her

25:18

at the time. So they processed all this together.

25:20

I can imagine Rose pacing

25:22

in their small apartment in Hollywood. Her

25:24

friend Jane is sitting on the couch,

25:26

totally blown away. I was

25:29

telling Jane, you know, this is just crazy. I

25:31

don't know, but I have to confront him. And

25:33

so Jane was like, well, my ex wife worked

25:35

in the field and maybe we can talk to

25:38

her about it. And she, because Jane

25:40

had told me years before and even she

25:42

had, I remember when I met her, she

25:45

was going through it with this place and

25:47

she was like, the owner is smoking crack

25:49

with clients, sleeping with clients, trying to give

25:51

the staff drugs. It was really insane. So

25:54

Jane, she figures might as well shoot my ex

25:56

wife a text. Who was that old

25:58

boss you had who slept with clients. Meanwhile

26:01

Rose gets up the courage to send a

26:04

text to Batham. She thought

26:06

back to their therapy sessions and

26:08

realized she had the perfect way

26:10

to lure him to meet immediately.

26:13

Rose started typing. I was

26:15

panicking and I was just like I'm feeling

26:17

like drinking like can we meet and he

26:19

said actually I think a drink is a

26:21

good idea. Batham

26:23

and Rose make plans to meet at

26:25

a restaurant. Jane offers to drive Rose

26:27

there. Jane and I get

26:30

in her car and we're driving there and it's kind

26:32

of a long drive and she's

26:34

really uneasy about me confronting my boss

26:36

and I'm just like I don't care

26:38

I got to do it because she's

26:40

like what if it's true like what

26:42

then and I must

26:44

have really held

26:46

out hope that it wasn't true. Well no

26:49

I did because right

26:53

as we're pulling in to the restaurant

26:57

and I see him standing in these

26:59

shorts which was weird I'd never seen

27:01

him in shorts just kind of waiting

27:03

for me outside. The ex-wife

27:06

texts Chris Batham. As

27:10

in oh that former boss

27:12

I had that slept with clients? Chris

27:14

Batham. No.

27:19

Yeah yeah. So

27:22

what did you do?

27:26

Unfortunately I

27:28

end up believing him.

27:39

Rose sits down at the restaurant bar

27:41

with Batham. They order drinks. Rose

27:44

said he looked mildly nervous. But

27:47

when Rose confronts Batham about everything

27:50

she's heard he denies it

27:52

all and he's got an explanation for

27:54

everything. The person who passed

27:57

along the rumor she's unstable. started

28:00

the rumors? It's that former investor.

28:02

Batham says he's been trashing him,

28:04

making all sorts of accusations online.

28:07

Rose had actually seen the investor's posts

28:09

on social media. And

28:12

then over the next few days,

28:14

Batham had the company's CFO tell

28:16

Rose how absurd the whole thing was.

28:19

I mean, I just felt so bad and

28:21

so crying. How are

28:23

you ever going to trust me? Scared that I

28:26

changed our wonderful dynamic? You know, all of it.

28:28

Wondering if my job is at risk now. You

28:31

have to understand. Batham

28:33

had an incredible power over Rose.

28:36

She felt he knew her inside and out.

28:38

He gave her free therapy. He gave her

28:40

a job when she was in crisis. No

28:43

rumor or coincidental text message could

28:45

change all that. Plus,

28:48

now he was forgiving her. He

28:50

even moved her into a new role at CRLA.

28:54

Batham asked her to be an

28:56

investigator. Gather information about this investor

28:58

who he said was harassing him. She

29:01

would be saving the company so they could

29:03

help more clients. That was

29:05

the idea. What I was

29:07

being told was that the

29:10

investor was even hiring people to

29:12

come work at CRLA, hiring people

29:14

to pose as clients and things

29:16

like that. And so I really

29:20

was passionate about stopping this guy

29:22

from putting out these rumors. They're

29:25

sick and hurting people. And

29:27

the rumors kept on coming. As

29:29

Rose is doing her investigating, she comes

29:32

across a video on social media with

29:34

a big allegation. There

29:36

are two people in this video. One

29:38

of them is the former investor. He's standing

29:40

beside a young woman. The

29:42

video is only 14 seconds long. And

29:45

it's alarming. But it's also really

29:47

weird. Haley.

29:49

Hello. Now Haley was

29:53

a client over at Chris Batham's place. And

29:57

would you mind saying on camera that you were drug and

29:59

raped? I was drugged and

30:01

raped by Chris Baltham. That's it. That's

30:04

the whole video. Rose

30:07

watches it and she still doesn't believe

30:09

it because she's focused on the

30:11

investor. He seems to be prompting

30:13

this client to speak and

30:16

Rose thinks, wow, what insane lengths

30:18

this guy is going to making

30:20

up a rumor about sexual assault.

30:22

He's going to stop. I

30:26

had the fear that other clients or

30:28

other staff would have the same just

30:30

wildly bad reaction

30:33

to hearing the rumors and

30:36

relapse. Baltham

30:38

has redirected the litter police.

30:41

He's convinced Rose he's not a bad guy. He's

30:44

the good guy. As

30:55

Chris Baltham deflects accusations against

30:57

him about sexual misconduct, Debbie

31:00

continues to build her fraud case against

31:02

him. But authorities,

31:05

they don't seem interested. And

31:07

I was going bonkers. I

31:09

mean bonkers, like literally banging my head

31:11

against the wall. Like how can nobody

31:14

be paying attention to this? Why doesn't

31:16

anybody care? That's

31:18

next on Reveal. From

31:34

the Center for Investigative Reporting and

31:36

PRX, this is Reveal. I'm

31:38

Al Ledson. Today we're partnering

31:41

with New Hampshire Public Radio to bring you

31:43

part of their podcast series, The 13th Step.

31:47

It's about two women, Rolstahl and

31:49

Debbie Herzog, who, independent of each

31:51

other, are investigating the founder and

31:54

owner of a chain of addiction

31:56

treatment centers, including one in

31:58

Los Angeles called CRLA. Debbie

32:01

is an insurance investigator and

32:03

she's uncovered hundreds of fraudulent

32:05

billings by the company but

32:07

when she writes up a report and sends

32:09

it to state authorities they refuse

32:12

to investigate. Reporter Lauren

32:14

Chiljian takes it from here. Debbie

32:19

Herzog was not off to a great

32:21

start. Debbie used to be

32:24

a federal prosecutor so she thinks, alright maybe

32:26

I'll have better luck with the feds. So

32:28

she takes the case over to them, tells them

32:31

how deep it seems to go and

32:33

that doesn't work either. In LA

32:36

they're really picky about the cases

32:38

they take and they're only looking

32:40

at really, really large dollar

32:43

cases and it wasn't

32:46

a large dollar case yet. When I

32:48

say large dollar case I mean they're

32:50

looking at a million

32:52

dollars or above and I was probably in

32:54

the thousands at the time. So

32:57

then I went to other insurance companies and

33:00

said, hey you

33:02

know look at this check out your billings

33:04

and started getting the other

33:06

insurance companies on board. The dollar

33:09

amounts obviously started getting higher. We

33:11

got more community recovery

33:13

clients from other insurance companies

33:15

but it still wasn't reaching

33:17

the threshold for federal investigation

33:20

or prosecution. That

33:23

was kind of stalling and

33:26

her call

33:28

came at the right time. One

33:35

day in February of 2015, Rose Stahl was

33:37

with her boss Chris

33:39

Batham in his Tesla. She

33:41

was a few months into her new job

33:43

as a sort of investigator for the company

33:45

keeping an eye on that investor who had

33:47

turned on Batham. I don't

33:49

remember what the investor was doing at the time

33:51

but it was something that was really upsetting to

33:54

Batham and so we were driving in his car

33:56

and he told me

34:00

that he had basically in a

34:02

roundabout hired someone to murder the

34:05

investor. Yeah.

34:09

Yeah. He's

34:12

like, you know, wouldn't it be better

34:14

if he were just gone? Well, yeah,

34:16

it would of course. Uh, well, wouldn't

34:20

it be, you know, what about him having a car wreck?

34:22

What if he had a car wreck in two weeks?

34:24

I'm like, what? Rose's

34:28

mind starts moving fast. Is he

34:30

joking? What is he saying? A car wreck?

34:32

Is this some weird therapy thing? It was

34:35

like he was trying to literally coax

34:38

me into buying

34:40

into and agreeing with

34:43

having the investor murdered.

34:47

And so I said directly, I said,

34:49

are we talking about murder? And I

34:52

looked at him in

34:54

the car and then

34:57

I saw it for the first time. I was

34:59

like, he's high. Rose

35:01

could see it in Bathams

35:03

face, beads of sweat,

35:05

eyes, wild, twitching things that before

35:08

she just wanted to see as

35:10

Bathams mannerisms. Now it

35:12

was obvious Rose

35:15

was scared, but she's

35:17

also Rose, the rule follower, the

35:19

litter police. She was determined

35:21

to find out if she was right. So

35:24

the next opportunity she gets to use

35:26

Bathams car by herself, she takes it.

35:29

It's days later. She hears Batham asking a

35:31

client to go charge the Tesla for him.

35:34

Rose intervenes. Let me charge it for you. So

35:37

she gets in Bathams car alone and

35:40

starts driving. I was

35:42

just looking around. I was looking while

35:44

I was driving, looking down and you

35:46

could see it. You could see little

35:48

devices, like pens that had sometimes people

35:50

would use like smoking heroin or meth

35:53

and this handprint on

35:55

the window that was

35:58

in a business. our position

36:00

where it looked like it was

36:03

like a handprint place in a way that

36:06

no natural position,

36:08

nobody would ever sit while the car was moving.

36:10

And so of course I was like, it looks

36:12

like a sexual position. Yeah, it

36:14

was devastating.

36:18

Rose also found drugs in the

36:20

car, methamphetamine. She took a short

36:22

video and some pictures. And

36:25

then suddenly Rose remembers the

36:27

rumor about the client, the

36:29

client who made a video where she said,

36:31

I was drugged and raped by Chris Bathum.

36:34

My first thought was, Oh

36:37

my God, Oh

36:39

my God, she was probably telling the truth. And

36:43

I have been for however many

36:45

months, a part

36:47

of the machine that is trying to

36:49

make people believe that she's a liar.

36:53

Rose calls a manager at CRLA and

36:55

tells them what she's found. And

36:58

maybe because she's found hard evidence,

37:00

this manager takes her really seriously.

37:03

Bathum is kicked out of the company,

37:06

but that is not where the story

37:08

ends. At first Rose

37:10

says, it seemed like all

37:13

the remaining managers were a unified

37:15

front against Bathum. Everyone

37:17

agreed what he did was wrong. And if he

37:19

tried to come back, Rose says they would go

37:21

to the police. That

37:23

lasted, Rose says, for maybe three

37:25

days. Rose learns Bathum

37:27

still has access to the company

37:29

systems, to the clients, even

37:32

when he wasn't at his facilities. He

37:35

was looking on the video, the

37:37

surveillance cameras and contacting clients, texting

37:39

female clients like, hi, see you

37:41

on the camera. And so

37:43

when I, you know, I thought that that would be

37:45

handled, I was made aware that that

37:47

would not be handled and there was nothing we could

37:49

do about it. but

38:00

this time against Batham. She

38:06

confronts other members of Batham's team, trying

38:09

to get someone, anyone in management, to

38:11

take her seriously. She's pushing

38:13

a lot of people, asking a lot

38:15

of questions, but it doesn't seem like

38:18

anyone cares. They didn't believe

38:20

her. You know, I just knew

38:22

that the cards were stacked against me, so I felt like

38:24

I was on a mission to find somebody who could represent

38:26

that better than I

38:28

could. Um... But

38:31

you're the litter police. I'm

38:34

the litter police. I'm

38:37

the litter police, but, you

38:39

know, I have the body of a woman.

38:43

Rose starts saving everything she can get

38:45

her hands on, and I

38:47

mean everything. When a colleague leaves

38:49

the company and takes his laptop with him,

38:51

Rose tracks him down to see what data

38:53

he has, and then that former

38:55

colleague connects her with another CRLA employee,

38:59

and they both claim Batham is running

39:01

an insurance scam. Rose will believe

39:03

anything at this point, so she starts

39:05

collecting documents. She's pulling string wherever

39:07

she can find it. She

39:09

knows she needs to call someone else outside the company

39:11

for help. Someone with power. But

39:15

who? Who do you call if your

39:17

boss is threatening to murder someone and

39:19

maybe running an insurance scam and is

39:21

also using drugs and is sexually assaulting

39:23

the clients of his treatment center? She

39:27

tried calling the FBI, but they didn't

39:29

get back to her. So

39:31

what about the state of California? Rose

39:33

thinks, maybe there's some licensing body that I

39:35

could turn to and file a report about

39:38

Batham. So she starts

39:40

researching. And then it was

39:43

a devastating blow to realize, oh, he's not

39:45

even a therapist. Chris

39:51

Batham was not even a

39:53

therapist. In fact,

39:56

he wasn't personally licensed to do anything.

39:59

All he had was a lawyer. a certificate

40:01

for hypnotherapy, hypnosis. He

40:04

didn't need a license to be a CEO

40:06

of a drug and alcohol treatment center in

40:08

California. So there was

40:10

no licensing board to report him to.

40:20

Rose says that was one of the

40:22

most interesting, infuriating, and frustrating

40:24

things about this case. Whatever

40:27

else had transpired in

40:30

those couple of weeks, it had

40:32

become very evident that nobody

40:35

in the company cared to stop

40:37

him from having sex with

40:39

all of his clients. And

40:42

nobody outside of the company

40:45

could care in a way that mattered. Rose

40:50

was stuck. She thought hard.

40:53

She started flipping through old paperwork

40:55

and documents, like the evidence

40:57

she had compiled to prove that the investor

40:59

was harassing Batham. And

41:02

that's when Rose stumbled on a

41:04

screenshot from the investor's Facebook.

41:07

He had posted a phone number for an

41:09

anthem investigator, a woman

41:11

named Debbie Herzog. Where

41:14

were you when Rose called? At

41:16

my desk in Dows

41:19

and Oaks, California. And

41:21

Rose pucks fast.

41:24

He was kind of throwing out a lot of

41:26

stuff. And she

41:28

was an insider. And as a prosecutor,

41:30

you know, you always need an insider to

41:32

have a successful prosecution. You

41:35

need a talker. You're always looking for

41:37

a talker. And

41:39

so I was really anxious to get

41:41

in touch with her. Where

41:44

did you meet? At a Starbucks.

41:46

And we sat there for

41:48

hours. Rose

41:53

begins with a story she heard from her colleague

41:55

that there might be insurance fraud. She

41:58

starts handing over documents, screens. e-mails

42:00

that she collected. I had

42:02

all my papers and I'm like trying

42:05

to, I have no idea about insurance fraud, but I'm like,

42:07

look at my little case that I put together and I'm

42:09

trying and... And that

42:11

moment though of watching

42:15

her kind of sift through

42:17

the limited amount of paperwork

42:19

that I had was

42:21

that fear

42:24

and anticipation and anxiety of what is

42:26

she going to say when she looks

42:28

up. I mean I was

42:30

just scribbling, taking down notes and

42:33

listening to her at the same time. And

42:35

she looked up and she was like, I

42:37

think we got, I think this is something,

42:39

I think this is something Rose. And

42:42

then she told me about the girls and

42:45

the information she had about

42:47

sexual assaults or possible sexual assaults.

42:50

How do I do that? Pretty

42:53

horrifying. You're talking about one

42:55

of the most vulnerable populations, you

42:59

know, addicted young

43:01

women. And so

43:03

it's easier

43:06

to take advantage of them because

43:08

the predator knows that nobody's

43:11

going to believe them. It's going to be

43:13

an addict's word against theirs.

43:16

So that makes them much more

43:18

vulnerable and much easier prey. It

43:22

felt like I had officially blown that whistle

43:24

that I had been threatening to blow and

43:27

that it was now in the right

43:29

hands and that it would be only

43:32

a matter of weeks. And

43:35

ta-da, everybody would be safe

43:37

and protected and he would be gone. Except...

43:43

Except that was February 2015.

43:48

And Batham wasn't convicted until

43:50

February 2018. In

43:54

the moment, Rose and Debbie's Starbucks meeting

43:56

felt like such a breakthrough for both

43:59

of them. And yet,

44:01

they still had years of work ahead. CRLA

44:04

fired Rose around this time. Rose

44:08

believes it was retaliation for investigating

44:10

Batham. In part because

44:12

Batham faxed a three-page letter of

44:14

threats to Debbie's office at Anthem, entitled

44:17

Please Give to Rose Stahl.

44:21

And yet, despite all of this,

44:23

Rose kept going. Rose

44:26

spent months after the Starbucks meeting,

44:28

going back and forth with the

44:30

Health Department. She'd write reports, submit

44:32

documents, find other CRLA people to

44:34

submit documents. There were like a

44:37

hundred emails. Just the

44:39

red tape and the evidence, it

44:41

just seemed never-ending. Everybody

44:43

always had somebody above them who

44:46

needed more. So

44:48

you get the Health Department, whoever their supervisor

44:50

is, needs more, more, more, more, and so

44:52

you get more, more, more, more, and then

44:54

her supervisor is like, oh, now

44:56

we need more, more, more. Debbie,

44:59

meanwhile, focused on law enforcement. She hoped

45:01

because of her background, she'd have an

45:03

in there. She asked Rose

45:05

to put her in touch with the client who said

45:07

in that video that she was raped by Batham.

45:10

She and I met for coffee as

45:13

well. And after I finished getting all

45:15

the information from her, I said, are you willing to go

45:17

to the police? And she said

45:19

yes. And I remember this. We were literally

45:21

standing on the corner outside the

45:23

Starbucks that we met at. And I started

45:25

dialing, like standing there. And

45:29

I dialed and dialed

45:31

and dialed for days and weeks

45:34

and months and could

45:36

not get anybody to work with me

45:38

on the assaults. Why?

45:43

First reason, drug addict victim,

45:46

not reliable. Second

45:49

reason, many of the victims, after I

45:51

spoke to other women, many of them

45:53

were assaulted in

45:56

different towns. Some

45:58

were L.A. city, some were... LA

46:00

County, there's different, you

46:03

know, county is the sheriff's department, city

46:05

is LAPD, if they're out in the

46:07

burbs, it's a local police

46:10

department. And they kept saying, well,

46:12

we can't do that. You know, we can only investigate what's in

46:14

our thing. I said, I don't think so. I mean, you

46:17

know, bank robberies cross jurisdictions all

46:19

the time and you guys investigate

46:22

those. Well, then

46:24

you're going to have to call the first place

46:26

that it happened. So

46:28

then I call the first place that it happened.

46:30

And no, no, no, we

46:32

had a couple of retired law enforcement officers

46:35

on our investigative staff at Blue Cross.

46:38

So I went to one of them. I said, I can't

46:40

be doing this cold calling. Nobody's listening to me. I

46:42

need a name. Can you give me a name of

46:44

the sex crimes detective? I can call. So

46:47

he gave me a name, a woman. I was all excited.

46:49

It's like maybe somebody will listen. She

46:53

gave me the same run around and

46:55

I was going bonkers. I

46:57

mean, bonkers, like literally banging my head

46:59

against the wall. Like how can nobody

47:01

be paying attention to this? Why doesn't

47:03

anybody care? But

47:06

Debbie, ever the prosecutor, presses

47:08

right on. I have

47:10

all these spreadsheets and all this stuff showing

47:12

all the fraud and thinking,

47:14

okay, you know, if I can get them

47:16

at least interested in the

47:18

fraud, get my foot in the door in the

47:20

fraud, which was really all I could pitch to them

47:22

given my job at the time. And

47:25

I literally walked myself

47:27

into the DA's office, asked

47:30

to see the head of the fraud section

47:33

and sat down with her and

47:35

her deputy for hours

47:37

and laid out this scheme and they

47:40

took it. And

47:44

they eventually got the sex

47:46

crimes over to the sex crimes unit

47:49

and they took that. Finally,

47:51

finally, law enforcement is

47:53

listening. The LA District Attorney's

47:56

Office takes the case. And

47:59

over the next few years. multiple agencies

48:01

would get involved. The FBI,

48:03

the California Department of Insurance,

48:05

the LA County Sheriff's Department,

48:08

and what they found, it's almost

48:11

beyond comprehension. The total

48:13

amount of fraud? A hundred

48:15

and seventy five million dollars. Batham

48:18

and his chief operating officer were charged

48:20

with leading the scheme. It

48:22

was one of the biggest health care fraud cases

48:25

in California. And

48:27

13 women came forward and

48:29

said Batham sexually assaulted them. The

48:33

trial was not wrenching, filled

48:35

with traumatic agonizing testimony from women

48:38

in their 20s and 30s who

48:40

hoped to finally find recovery at

48:42

CRLA. Batham

48:45

sexually assaulted one client during a

48:47

guided group meditation in a sweat

48:49

lodge. Many women said Batham

48:51

gave them drugs, heroin, meth,

48:54

and cocaine. In

48:56

2020, five years after Rose

48:59

and Debbie first met at Starbucks,

49:01

Batham was sentenced to 52

49:04

years in prison. In

49:06

the sentencing memo, the LA District Attorney

49:08

wrote, In

49:22

order for someone to be caught for

49:24

sexually abusing clients of a treatment center,

49:26

the thing that client needs most, Debbie

49:28

says, is someone to stand up for

49:30

them. People with

49:32

substance use disorder already face

49:34

so many obstacles like shame,

49:36

stigma, not being believed. And

49:39

there's only so many times you can get

49:41

beaten over the head and you just stop

49:43

complaining. So

49:46

somebody, you know, somebody needs to be their

49:48

advocate. That's the

49:50

key, an advocate. Yes, somebody

49:52

needs to be their advocate. Thanks

50:00

to reporter Lauren Chiljian for sharing this story with

50:03

us. The 13th Step was

50:05

recently honored with the DuPont Columbia

50:07

Award. You can listen to the

50:09

entire series wherever you get your podcasts and

50:11

you'll find a link to it at revealnews.org.

50:15

Taki Telenides and Katie Collinari edited

50:17

today's show. The 13th Step was

50:19

created by New Hampshire Public Radio's document

50:21

team. Lauren Chiljian reported and produced

50:23

the series with help from Jason Moon

50:25

who also wrote the original music

50:27

for the series. She was

50:30

edited by Alison McAdam with help from

50:32

Katie Collinari and Dan Barak. The fact

50:34

checker was Danya Suleiman. Victoria

50:37

Baranetski is our general counsel. Our production

50:39

managers are Stephen Raskone and Zulema Cobb.

50:42

Mixing and sound design by the

50:44

dynamic duo Jay Breezy, Mr. Jim

50:46

Briggs and Fernando Maman Yo Arruda

50:48

with Jason Moon. Our

50:51

CEO is Robert Rosenthal. Our COO is

50:53

Maria Feldman. Our intern executive producers are

50:55

Brett Myers and Taki Telenides. The theme

50:58

music is by Kamarato, Lightning. Support

51:00

for Reveals provided by the Reeve and

51:03

David Logan Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the

51:05

John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation,

51:07

the Johns and Logan Family Foundation, the

51:09

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Park Foundation

51:11

and the Hellman Foundation. Reveal

51:14

is a co-production of the Center for

51:16

Investigative Reporting and PRX. I'm

51:18

Al Ledson and remember there is always more

51:21

to the story. From

51:40

PRX.