A Missouri Republican state representative has resigned days after being convicted of 22 federal charges, the majority of those offenses being linked to a $900,000 COVID-19 fraud scheme operated through medical clinics and a non-profit at the onset of the coronavirus pandemic in 2020.
State Rep. Tricia Derges stepped down Friday from her seat representing Christian County (District 140) in the Missouri House of Representatives, KOLR reported.
Her resignation came four days after she was convicted on June 28 by a federal trial jury for what prosecutors described as a nearly $900,000 COVID-19 fraud scheme, as well as a separate $200,000 fraud scheme in which she made false claims about a fake stem cell treatment marketed through her clinics in southern Missouri, and for illegally providing prescription drugs to clients of those clinics.
The 64-year-old from Nixa, Mo., was found guilty of 10 counts of wire fraud, 10 counts of distributing drugs over the internet without a valid prescription, and two counts of making false statements to a federal law enforcement agent, the Justice Department announced earlier last week.
“This is an elected official who stole money from the public, a purported humanitarian who cheated and lied to her patients, and a medical professional who illegally distributed drugs,” U.S. Attorney Teresa Moore said in a statement last Tuesday. “She violated her position of trust to selfishly enrich herself at the expense of others. But a jury of her peers, in a unanimous verdict, saw through her smokescreen of excuses and ridiculous claims, and now she will be held accountable for her criminal behavior.”
Despite her biography on the Missouri House of Representatives saying she is “a medical doctor and entrepreneur,” the DOJ stressed that Derges “is not a physician but is licensed as an assistant physician.”
She operates three for-profit Ozark Valley Medical Clinic locations in Springfield, Ozark, and Branson, Missouri, as well as the non-profit corporation Lift Up Someone Today, Inc., with a medical and dental clinic in Springfield, prosecutors said. Her official Missouri House of Representatives biography says the non-profit is a “medical-dental-mental health mission clinic that provides care for the homeless, poor and veterans,” and that Derges “teaches medical students board review classes for their USMLE licensing exams.”
Regarding the COVID fraud scheme, prosecutors said Derges attempted to receive $900,000 in CARES Act funds. She was actually awarded $296,574 in CARES Act funds for Lift Up, even though although Lift Up did not provide any COVID-19 testing services to its patients and in fact, closed at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and remained closed from March to June 2020.
Derges fraudulently claimed Lift Up provided COVID-19 testing and sought reimbursement for “COVID-19 eligible expenses” that Lift Up had incurred. To support her claim, Derges provided invoices totaling $296,574 from Dynamic DNA for more than 3,000 COVID-19 laboratory tests.
Derges submitted the Dynamic DNA invoices as Lift Up expenditures, although they were actually for testing done at Derges’s for-profit Ozark Valley Medical Clinic, prosecutors said.
This is an excerpt from New York Post.
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