Home Health & Hospice Week

Treating a company pension fund like a personal bank account is asking for serious trouble from the feds, as the owners of a Louisiana home health agency chain have learned the hard way. A federal appeals court July 17 affirmed a seven-year prison term for John Herring and Martha Sewell Herring, former owners of the Bayou State's "Golden Age" chain and a number of related businesses. The Herrings were convicted of conspiracy, pension plan theft, health care fraud and bankruptcy fraud. The Herrings transferred HHA funds - primarily derived from Medicare reimbursement - into the agencies' pension funds, then immediately siphoned the funds into their real estate investments and other businesses. When faced with paying back years of overpayments and disallowed costs, the pair put the HHAs into bankruptcy and concealed the debt their other enterprises owed the agencies. After their conviction, the Herrings appealed for relief to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals - but to no avail (U.S. v. Herring [No. 02-30533]). The case is at www.ca5.uscourts.gov/opinions/OpinHome.cfm.