Home Health & Hospice Week

Instead of the typical Medicare fraud, two Monroe, Louisiana-area home health agency executives have been indicted on bank fraud charges related to a check kiting scheme they ran in 2016 and 2017.

Charlie L. Simpson and Charles R. Gardner, who were COO and CFO/Controller at United Home Care Inc. and Trinity Home Health Care Inc., respectively, “orchestrated and executed a check kite between accounts” at two banks, says the Department of Justice in a release. “They deposited hundreds of checks between multiple accounts they controlled at both banks and took advantage of the float when they passed the checks, timing the exchanges to artificially inflate the account balances,” DOJ explains.

Then: Simpson learned that accounts under his control had an overdraft and the bank would only accept a certified check to cover the deficit, so “to cover the overdraft and prevent the kite from collapsing, Simpson and Gardner allegedly added a third bank,” DOJ charges. Simpson and Gardner caused [the banks] to honor checks and payments drawn against accounts with insufficient funds and put the financial institutions at risk” to the tune of $4 million, according to the release.