Former Adult Day Care Owner Sentenced for Health Care Fraud Scheme

From the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Western District of Texas:

SAN ANTONIO – On Monday a San Antonio woman was sentenced to 60 months in prison and ordered to pay $1,784,817.96 in restitution for her role in a health care fraud scheme and theft of Social Security benefits. The Court also entered a money judgment against the defendant in the amount of $1,784,817.96. The money judgment represents the proceeds that she obtained as part of her scheme.

According to court documents, Scherry Lynn Moses, 54, owned and operated adult day care centers in and around the San Antonio area. Doing business as Scherry’s Adult Day Activity Center, Moses defrauded the Texas Medicaid Program by fraudulently billing for items and services that had not been provided to the clients of the day care centers. Moses also ran New Creation Residential Care Homes, a room and board business for Social Security recipients. Moses was also the representative payee for Social Security recipients who resided in her boarding homes. She charged each boarder from $500 to $700 a month to live in a rental property, often placing five to seven boarders to a property. Moses inconsistently provided the boarders with basic needs and at times left them to fend for themselves. In addition, she would refuse to make rent payments on the properties resulting in forcible evictions of the boarders. Moses used the money from the scheme for her own personal gain.

The defendant carried out the scheme between 2008 and 2016, resulting in an actual loss of $1,784,817.96.

On March 4, 2020, Moses pleaded guilty to one count of Health Care Fraud, one count of wire fraud and one count of theft of government funds.

“Instead of providing necessary services to trusting elderly and disabled Texas citizens, this defendant chose to fleece them of their Medicaid and Social Security benefits for her own selfish gain,” said U.S. Attorney Ashley C. Hoff. “We will continue to seek justice on behalf of these vulnerable members of our society and the critical government programs that serve them.”

“Organizational representative payees are a vital resource to Social Security beneficiaries who need help managing their benefits. Scherry Moses knowingly abused her role and ignored her responsibilities when she misused multiple Social Security beneficiaries’ benefit payments for her own use,” said Gail S. Ennis, Inspector General for the Social Security Administration. “We will continue to work with the Social Security Administration and other agencies to identify organizations and people who abuse their role as representative payees and steal program funds from beneficiaries. I thank the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit for their partnership in this investigation, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for their efforts to hold Ms. Moses accountable for her crimes.”

The Social Security Administration Office of Inspector General and the Texas Attorneys General’s Office Medicaid Fraud Control Unit investigated this case.

Assistant U.S. Attorneys Fidel Esparza III, and Rex Beasley prosecuted this case on behalf of the government.