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Press Release

Former Executive Director of Zaneville's Center for Child and Family Development Sentenced for Stealing Program Funds

For Immediate Release
U.S. Attorney's Office, Southern District of Ohio

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Melissa Daley, 45, of Nashport, Ohio was sentenced in U.S. District Court to 12 months and one day in prison and ordered to pay approximately $103,000 in restitution and a $25,000 fine for filing a false income tax return with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), wire fraud and money laundering.

Benjamin C. Glassman, Acting United States Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio, Kathy A. Enstrom, Special Agent in Charge, Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation (IRS), and Angela L. Byers, Special Agent in Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Cincinnati Field Division and Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine announced the sentence handed down today by U.S. District Judge Gregory L. Frost.

According to court documents, since 1992 Daley acted as the Executive Director for the Center for Child and Family Development (CCFD) in Zanesville, Ohio. CCFD, a non-profit organization, provided foster care and residential case services to children as well as adult care services.

In June 2009, on behalf of CCFD, Daley applied to the Ohio Department of Developmental Disabilities (DODD) to allow for CCFD to be a part of the Individual Options Waiver Program (I/O Waiver Program).  This program allowed for continued care of adult individuals with mental or developmental disabilities and permitted qualified individuals to remain in their homes and obtain support for their disabilities rather than requiring them to live in an Intermediate Care Facility for the Mentally Retarded.  The application was approved by DODD.

Between March 2011 and November 2012 Daley devised a scheme to defraud CCFD, by diverting payments for the waiver program to a personal checking account for Daley. As a result of this fraudulent scheme, Daley received $71,977.31 of CCFD’s I/O Waiver funds that were deposited into her personal checking.

In addition, in August 2011, after having resigned from CCFD, Daley opened a new bank account in the name of CCFD and claimed she was the President of the organization. After opening the account, Daley again caused waiver program funds to be deposited into her bank account.  Once Daley received CCFD’s I/O Waiver funds she would immediately transfer the funds into another bank account in the name of Community Base Services, which was a newly formed entity created by Daley. As a result of this fraudulent scheme, Daley received an additional $296,115.00 of CCFD’s I/O Waiver funds into her personal bank account.

Daley did not report any of the funds she fraudulently obtained on her 2011 or 2012 income tax returns. The total unreported income on Daley’s 2011 and 2012 income tax returns was $360,182.37 resulting in additional taxes due and owing to the IRS in the amount of $103,043.07.

Acting U.S. Attorney Glassman commended the cooperative investigation by the FBI, IRS, and Ohio Attorney General’s Medicaid Fraud Unit, as well as Assistant United States Attorney Kenneth F. Affeldt, who is representing the United States in this case.

Updated March 16, 2016

Topic
Tax