4-Year Sentence For Dallas Woman Who Posed As Hospice Nurse

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DALLAS (CBSDFW.COM) — A Dallas woman who plead guilty to fraud late last year for stealing a registered nurse's identity was sentenced by a U.S. District Judge on Monday.

Jada Necole Antoine posed as the registered nurse and purportedly treated nearly 250 hospice patients for companies across North Texas. She was sentenced to 48 months in federal prison and to pay $233,000 in restitution.

Antoine was not a licensed health care provider, according to court documents. She stole the registered nurse's social security card and driver's license and used that identity to get jobs at eight hospice companies. She was directly responsible for patient care at two companies — Heart to Heart Hospice of Texas and Odyssey Healthcare, both with locations in Dallas and Fort Worth.

While falsely presenting herself as a nurse, Antoine violated victims by giving them physical exams and assessing patients who were unresponsive to touch and sound, such as those who were mentally ill or asleep.

The 34-year-old's crimes also had a financial impact. The hospice agencies submitted Medicare and Medicaid claims for the hospice services Antoine provided while impersonating the nurse. The Medicare claims filed from January 2009 to August 2012 totaled nearly $2.3 million. Antoine received nearly $107,000 in compensation from the eight agencies.

Antoine was arrested in July 2014 and has been in custody since. She plead guilty to fraud in December 2014.

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