Arizona church accused in multi million dollar scam by illegals

Blaze:

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Happy House Behavioral Health faces multiple charges, including conspiracy, fraudulent schemes and artifices, client referral fraud, money laundering, theft, and forgery.

A church and 20 individuals are also facing felony charges related to the alleged scam.

In July 2023, Happy House Behavioral Health allegedly paid $5 million to Hope of Life International Church. The house of worship was accused of later wiring $2 million to an entity based in Rwanda.

The charges are part of a larger investigative effort to address a $2.8 billion fraud scheme that exploited the state’s Medicaid system as part of a broader “sober living crisis.” More than 100 individuals have been indicted in connection to the scam.

The Associated Press reported that the massive scam has disproportionately impacted Arizona's Native American population, resulting in an unknown number falling victim to fraudulent sober living homes and becoming homeless after funding was pulled from the unlicensed facilities.

Hayden Dublois, a data and analytics director with the Foundation for Government Accountability, told Blaze News, “Waste, fraud, and abuse are rampant in the Medicaid program, and this latest case is a classic example of the types of coordinated, criminal efforts to defraud states and federal taxpayers.”

Hope of Life International Church denied the accusations in a statement to the AP. It claimed that it accepted donations from a licensed sober living facility that was a tenant of the church. The AP reported that the church further contended that it did not control the facility’s operations, financial practices, or management decisions.

“The church’s only relationship was that of a landlord and, later, as a recipient of a donation — a donation accepted in good faith, consistent with its mission and longstanding practice,” the church stated.
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I suspect the Behavioral Health facility is not happy after this arrest. As a former prosecutor, I found it not that unusual for some alleged religious groups to engage in fraudulent transactions. In one of my first big cases, a religious group was involved in a scam. One of the leaders of that group accused one of the lawyers I was working with of ties to the devil. Ironically, I was able to get him to plead guilty to a hard time in the Texas penitentiary.