(Bloomberg) -- Former National Basketball Association player Sebastian Telfair pleaded guilty Wednesday to participating in a plan to defraud the league’s health care plan.

Telfair, 37, who played for teams including the Boston Celtics and Phoenix Suns, joins a growing list of ex-NBA players who’ve admitted their role in a sprawling scheme to submit false claims for medical and dental expenses. 

The alleged leader of the scheme, former player Terrence Williams, the 11th overall pick in the 2009 NBA draft, pleaded guilty in August to recruiting other participants and giving them false invoices provided by a dentist in California, a doctor in Washington state and several non-medical professionals in exchange for kickbacks. 

Federal prosecutors in New York have charged two dozen people in the scheme, including at least a dozen former NBA players. Telfair is among the more notable names of the group, along with Glen “Big Baby” Davis, who won a title with the Celtics in 2008, and Darius Miles, the third overall pick in the 2000 NBA draft. 

Telfair said he participated in the scheme because he needed money to pay for a divorce and for lawyers in another criminal case. Telfair was sentenced to 3 1/2 years in prison for possession of a weapon after police found handguns in his truck during a June 2017 traffic stop. A New York appeals court upheld his sentence last October. 

“I needed the money for my legal fees,” Telfair told US District Judge Valerie Caproni at his plea hearing Wednesday. “I was accused of a crime I didn’t commit. I was fighting for my life. I am still fighting for my life.”

Telfair faces as many as 20 years in prison when he is sentenced on Aug. 1. 

More than a half-dozen people have already pleaded guilty. Last month, Keyon Dooling, a former vice president of the NBA’s union who was coaching with the Utah Jazz at the time of his arrest, was sentenced to 30 months in prison, while Alan Anderson, who suited up for five teams over a span of 12 years, got two years behind bars.

Telfair, a former New York City streetball legend, was one of the most coveted prospects in history while playing for Brooklyn’s Abraham Lincoln High School. He was chosen in the first round of the 2004 NBA draft by the Portland Trail Blazers. Over the next decade, he played for the Boston Celtics, Minnesota Timberwolves, Los Angeles Clippers, Cleveland Cavaliers, Phoenix Suns, Toronto Raptors, and Oklahoma City Thunder.

The case is U.S. v. Williams, 21-cr-00603, US District Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan).

©2023 Bloomberg L.P.