The owner of an assisted living company in Alaska was sentenced to five years in jail, and her company will have to pay a fine of up to $2.05 million for Medicaid fraud that was discovered after a murder took place at one of the facilities, Anchorage Superior Court Judge Patrick McKay ruled May 20.
All but 18 months of Margaret Williams’ sentence was suspended.
The state also asked the judge to issue a restitution order for $1.1 million to compensate for the funds that Williams and her company, Flamingo Eye LLC, fraudulently obtained from the Alaska Medicaid system. A hearing to determine the amount of restitution has been set for July.
A jury found Williams and Flamingo Eye guilty in September. The same jury acquitted Williams’ daughter, Princess Turay, of all charges against her. Williams’ son, Donald Kallon, has a warrant out for his arrest and is believed to have left the country.
Williams’ former employee, Wilson Esapa, had his charges dismissed in exchange for testifying at trial. Turay, Kallon and Esapa were managers for the company.
Williams, Turay and Kallon had been indicted in 2017 after the assisted living company reportedly billed the state for more than $1 million in home- and community-based services that were not rendered as required under residents’ plans of care. Each of the three were indicted on three felony counts of medical assistance fraud, one count of scheme to defraud and one count of evidence tampering. Esapa was indicted on a single count of evidence tampering. Additionally, all four were alleged to have committed several misdemeanor offenses for knowingly falsifying medical records.
The Alaska Department of Law said the fraud came to light after a resident of Williams’ Eye to Eye ALH, Gilbert Nashookpuk, in November 2015 murdered the sole caretaker working at the time. Eye to Eye was fined $75,000 and cited in connection with the murder. Nashookpuk subsequently was sentenced to 60 years in prison.
The fraud occurred from January 2011 to December 2016, according to the department.
