A federal grand jury in Chicago returned an indictment charging a former nursing home employee with seven counts of wire fraud. According to court documents, Alisha Richardson, 44, of Chicago, devised a scheme to defraud her employer, a Chicago-area nursing home, of funds by falsifying records to generate payments to individuals who never worked at the facility (so-called “ghost” employees). The indictment alleges that, as part of the scheme, Richardson created false records to make it appear as though the individuals were employed as Certified Nursing Assistants, when in fact they were not working at the nursing home. The indictment further alleges that Richardson logged false hours for these “ghost” employees, which caused the nursing home to issue paychecks. According to the indictment, some “ghost” employees cashed the checks and shared the proceeds with Richardson. The indictment further alleges that on other occasions Richardson forged endorsement signatures for the individuals and deposited the paychecks into her own bank accounts. As a result of the scheme, the nursing home paid out over $100,000 for work that was never performed.
