A Marion County Superior Court, pursuant to a plea agreement, has sentenced a nurse to three years following her conviction on multiple counts of forgery. The defendant, Mia Merriweather, was taken into custody at her Oct. 15 sentencing to serve 60 of those days in jail. Merriweather was also ordered to pay $7,956.25 in restitution to the Indiana Medicaid Program during her probation.
The case was investigated by Attorney General Curtis Hill’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit (MFCU) and was subsequently prosecuted by the Marion County Prosecutor’s Office with the assistance of counsel from the MFCU.
Merriweather defrauded Indiana Medicaid by submitting fraudulent timecards to her employer, Indiana Fitness Works, from Sept. 17, 2017, to Dec. 4, 2017. Each timecard contained false time entries, and Merriweather accepted payment for services that she never provided. Under the plea agreement, Merriweather pleaded guilty to three counts of forgery.
“These types of cases are essentially about theft,†Attorney General Hill said. “Indiana Medicaid was robbed of the resources that are needed to serve more than a million Hoosiers who depend on it to survive. Indiana taxpayers, whose hard-earned money keeps this system funded, were defrauded in the process. Unfortunately, we see these cases far too often. Our Medicaid Fraud Control Unit works tirelessly to investigate these crimes to protect Medicaid and those whom it serves.â€
