Milwaukee woman charged in $2M Medicaid fraud case

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The Wisconsin Department of Justice has filed felony charges against Milwaukee woman investigators allege stole more than $2 million from the state’s Medicaid system.

Debbie Long of Milwaukee was charged May 5 in Milwaukee County Circuit Court with two counts of money laundering, one count each of wire fraud against a financial institution, fraud against a financial institution and theft for allegedly billing Medicaid between 2017 and 2022 for “personal care services” she never provided.

According to the criminal complaint, Long’s company Pinnacle Home Health Care received $2.2 million in fraudulent Medicaid payments and obtained a $219,072 loan under the federal Paycheck Protection Program by inflating the size of her company’s workforce and payroll expenses.

Long, 44, allegedly used the money she received to purchase Kitt’s Frozen Custard in Milwaukee, a car wash and a vehicle.

She funneled the fraud proceeds through three shell companies to purchase a Mercedes Benz AMG S63, which costs nearly $200,000 new, and an Octopus Car Wash, investigators allege.

According to investigators, Long allegedly carried out the bulk of the scheme by billing Medicaid for impossible amounts of service. For example, Long was paid $750,752 for 96 units of personal care services in a single day for one individual. That amounts to 1,440 hours of service in a 24-hour timespan.

In another instance, Long submitted a claim for 13,500 hours of personal care service for one member in one day.

Investigators pinpointed some of the alleged fraudulent payments through interviews with Long’s employee or patients. Long’s company was paid nearly $250,000 for services that either the worker or patient said never took place, according to the complaint.

To get a bigger PPP loan, Long allegedly claimed to employ 120 workers instead of the 46 she said she employed in documents submitted to state officials in the same time period.