Only one of 14 people indicted in an insurance fraud scheme involving the state health plan apparently plans to take her chances at trial.
Sonya Mitchell, 35, is expected to be tried in March on charges stemming from the scheme in which the participants received more than $500,000 from the State and School Employees Health Insurance Plan for medical procedures that were never performed.
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Mitchell’s attorney, Cynthia Stewart, could not be reached Friday or Saturday. She told The Clarion-Ledger in September that her client intended to fight the conspiracy and fraud charges.
Mitchell, Zaveon Cooper and Crystal A. Barnes, all of Jackson, had been set for trial this month. The other 11 defendants had pleaded guilty. But last week, the attorney general’s office announced that Cooper and Barnes also had pleaded guilty.
Cooper, 36, was sentenced Tuesday to 12 years in prison and five years of supervised probation. He had entered an open plea Nov. 15 before Rankin County Circuit Judge John Emfinger to three counts each of conspiracy, insurance fraud, mail fraud and making false representations to defraud the government.
Cooper also was ordered to pay, jointly with his co-defendants, nearly $92,000 in restitution to Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Mississippi, plus $3,524 for court fees and other costs.
Blue Cross & Blue Shield administers the health plan and replaced the stolen money.
Cooper’s attorney, Warren Martin Jr., would not comment Friday. But he told The Clarion-Ledger in September ” Mr. Cooper, … did not receive any check from the Blue Cross & Blue Shield network. He has fully cooperated with authorities in their investigation. He looks forward to being fully vindicated by a jury of his peers.”
Barnes, 36, pleaded guilty Nov. 7 to one count each of conspiracy to commit insurance fraud, insurance fraud and making false representations to defraud the government. An employee of Jackson Public Schools during the scheme, she was sentenced to five years in prison plus five years of supervised probation.
Barnes also was ordered to pay, jointly with her co-defendants, $40,000 restitution to Blue Cross & Blue Shield and $3,600 in court fees and other costs.
Under the scheme, which began in December 2008, Mitchell and two other Blue Cross & Blue Shield employees approved phony health claims for state and school employees and got kickbacks in return, prosecutors have said. Mitchell allegedly shared in six checks, ranging from $7,242.40 to $44,379.72, based on information from the attorney general’s office.
Attorney Randy Harris represented Fonda Church, 46, a former state Department of Health employee. He said his client entered a guilty plea because she faced anywhere from 40 to 60 years in prison if convicted at trial. That prospect was too risky, he said, when asked about the case by phone Saturday night. Church, 46, of Jackson received a seven-year sentence.
“She had cooperated with (investigators) early on and (admitted) her wrongdoing,” Harris said. “The evidence was overwhelming.”
