Jimmy D. Davis Jr., the former Milwaukee funeral home owner who embezzled thousands of dollars from grieving families, is now facing felony healthcare fraud charges.
Davis and his company, JD Davis Enterprises LLC, are accused of stealing nearly $900,000 from Medicaid by making claims based on “false and fraudulent statements,” according to a federal grand jury indictment, which was filed June 3 in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin. The indictment was initially filed under seal.
Davis, 43, and his company face 14 felony healthcare fraud counts and, if convicted, would forfeit at least $873,573.61, which is the money he obtained through fraud, the indictment said.
Davis is accused of unlawfully obtaining Medicaid funds between May 2022 and about January 2024 by submitting fraudulent reimbursement claims for his company, which was providing non-emergency medical transportation services through Family Care – a Wisconsin Medicaid long-term care program for older adults and adults with disabilities.
Davis repeatedly submitted “claims for mileage that were inflated and claims for transportation that never occurred,” the indictment said.
“It was further part of the scheme to defraud that, in response to official government requests for business records, Jimmy Davis Jr. falsely claimed that the records were lost,” the indictment added.
Davis and his company were previously the focus of a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel investigation in 2022 and 2023.
The newspaper reported in June 2022 that JD Davis Enterprises had brought in $555,600 in taxpayer dollars for transporting dead bodies to the Milwaukee County Medical Examiner’s Office since 2019 despite Davis’ troubled track record, which included about a dozen regulatory complaints against him and his businesses and a 2021 felony embezzlement charge.
The complaints alleged a variety of wrongdoing by Davis and his businesses, including forgery, pocketing money set aside for funerals, refusing to release the ashes of a loved one and raising the cost of funerals when he learned the family of the deceased had received an insurance payment.
Davis, who owned two now-defunct JD Davis Funeral Homes, was charged in 2021 with felony embezzlement for stealing $15,000 after authorities said he pocketed prepaid funeral funds.
In June 2022, he was charged with one felony count of bail jumping and accused of transporting a dead body in his hearse after Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Danielle Shelton had banned him from transporting any human remains. That case came after a witness told investigators that he saw the body of a woman being loaded into a hearse that belonged to Davis.
A witness also said “the embalming process was not going as planned” but that Davis “did not seem to care,” according to the complaint.
Davis pleaded guilty in February 2023 to three felonies, including embezzlement and identity theft. He was sentenced to 90 days in jail in April of that year.
“You have been a predator in our community,” Shelton said during a half-hour sentencing hearing. “You have preyed upon people who are grieving.”
“This is a life-changing experience for me. I take full responsibility of what transpired,” Davis said in court after Shelton asked if he had anything to say. “It has been a very embarrassing moment for myself and my family.”
It wasn’t immediately clear how Davis was allowed to provide Medicaid-funded medical transportation services after his convictions in 2023.
Davis could not be reached for comment.
The federal case is being prosecuted by Special Assistant U.S. Attorney Daniel Hess and Assistant U.S. Attorney William M. Levins.
Davis’ case was listed as part of a nationwide, $6.5 billion healthcare fraud takedown announced by the U.S. Department of Justice on June 24. More than 450 people across 45 states have been charged in connection with the effort.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Former Milwaukee funeral home owner faces federal Medicaid fraud charges
Reporting by Mary Spicuzza, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Mary Spicuzza, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel | USA TODAY Network
