U.S. Attorney Charges Inmate Health Consultant with Lying to FBI

BIRMINGHAM – The U.S. Attorney’s Office on Tuesday charged a Vestavia Hills man with making false statements to the FBI in relation to payments from a contractor providing inmate health care at the Jefferson County Jail, announced Acting U.S. Attorney Robert O. Posey and FBI Special Agent in Charge Roger C. Stanton.

Prosecutors filed a one-count information in U.S. District Court charging MICHAEL P. GODDARD, 68, a consultant on inmate health at the county jail, with falsely telling FBI agents that payments he received from a Jefferson County contractor were unrelated to a specific contract.

A plea agreement with Goddard filed in conjunction with the charging document, states that Birmingham FBI agents questioned Goddard in August 2016 while they were investigating recurring monthly payments to him from Davis & Associates, a Birmingham consulting firm, and “another entity that were funded by Health Assurance, LLC, a company that from 2007 through 2011 had contracts with the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office to provide health care to Jefferson County jail inmates.”

According to the plea agreement, the sheriff’s office contracted with Health Assurance in about February 2007 to provide inmate health care, and the contract could be renewed yearly. Soon after Health Assurance began receiving payments from Jefferson County, Goddard began receiving monthly payments from Davis & Associates that were funded by Health Assurance, the plea agreement states.

In July 2011, the payments to Goddard funded by Health Assurance began coming from a different entity, according to the plea agreement. The documents do not name the second entity. The payments to Goddard continued to about October 2011, when Health Assurance’s contract with the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office ended, the plea agreement states.

FBI agents interviewed Goddard on Aug. 31 and served him with a grand jury subpoena for records. The agents asked Goddard about the monthly payments he received that were funded by Health Assurance. Goddard told the agents that the monthly payments he received were unrelated to Health Assurance’s contracts with Jefferson County.

Goddard knew that statement was false “in that he knew the payments he received were directly related to the contracts, and he knew that this false statement was material to the FBI’s investigation,” the plea agreement states.

The maximum penalty for making a false statement to the FBI is five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

The FBI is investigating the case, which Assistant U.S. Attorney George Martin is prosecuting.

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