Category: Hall of Shame

Here are stories about some of the embezzlers and other rule-breakers we have encountered.  Wondering if someone with a “past” is working in your office?  Read on…

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A Cold Case Solved 23 Years Later — NY Dental Embezzler Convicted of 1996 Murder of Husband

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Howard Pilmar, a successful New York businessman, was found dead inside his Manhattan office on March 21, 1996 — a slaying that shocked New Yorkers because of its brutality.

Pilmar’s throat was slashed and he was stabbed 48 times. The attack continued after his heart stopped beating and his body was left on the floor, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance said in a news release.

Investigators spent more than two decades looking for his killers and finally arrested two people in 2017 — Pilmar’s widow, Roslyn Pilmar, then 60, and her brother, Evan Wald, then 43.

Friday, a jury found them guilty of second-degree murder.

Wald’s lawyer could not be reached for comment Saturday. Sanford Talkin, Roslyn Pilmar’s lawyer, told CNN, “We are disappointed in the verdict and plan to appeal and continue to fight the case.”

Prosecutors said Roslyn Pilmar had financial problems and benefited from her husband’s death.

She managed the coffee shops started by her husband inside his office supply stores and owed $15,000 in unpaid state taxes on that part of the business, the district attorney’s office said. Wald also worked in the coffee shops.

In early 1996, before Howard’s death, Roslyn Pilmar’s former employer, a dentist’s office, demanded reimbursement of approximately $200,000 it claimed she had stolen from the business, prosecutors said.

In the news release, the district attorney’s office said Roslyn Pilmar and her brother requested keys to the building where Howard Pilmar’s office was located and asked for information about how to close the office at night and where the video cameras were located in the building lobby.

“Then on March 21, 1996, the defendants met the victim at his office,” the district attorney said. Howard Pilmar’s body was found the next morning by the company’s controller.

After her husband’s death, Pilmar received around $1.2 million in life insurance benefits, according to the district attorney. She also received ownership of Howard Pilmar’s businesses, two homes and custody of the couple’s then 10-year-old son.

Roslyn Pilmar used the money to repay her debts, the DA’s office said. On April 30, 1999, she pleaded guilty to grand larceny in the second degree for the theft from her former employer. After paying back the stolen funds, she was sentenced to probation.

The investigation found new life in 2013 after police found witnesses with new information and new evidence, blood at the crime scene that was a match to Evan Wald, Assistant District Attorney Elizabeth Lederer said.

“For nearly 23 years, Roslyn Pilmar and Evan Wald evaded justice for their gruesome crime and thought they would get away with it, but today, a jury rightfully found them guilty of Murder in the Second Degree for planning Mr. Pilmar’s murder together and acting in concert to carry out the cold-blooded killing,” Vance said.

“I thank the prosecutors in my Office’s Cold Case and Forensic Sciences Unit and NYPD detectives for more than two decades of dedication to this case and ensuring that Howard’s death was never forgotten.”

Content retrieved from: https://kbzk.com/cnn-national/2019/03/09/a-businessman-was-stabbed-to-death-in-1996-his-widow-and-her-brother-have-now-been-convicted-of-the-crime/

Delano, CA woman pleads not guilty in alleged insurance fraud scheme

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BAKERSFIELD, Calif. – A woman is facing multiple fraud charges accused of a scheme while working at a dental office.

Investigators say Karla Morales and her husband Raymundo filed nearly 80 fraudulent insurance claims while she worked for Delano Family Dentistry.

The dentistry confirmed she was fired in March.

Court documents say Morales forged the claims while making the reimbursements payable to her husband.

The couple allegedly made nearly $47,000.

Morales pleaded not guilty to all charges Thursday.

Content retrieved from: https://www.kget.com/news/local-news/woman-pleads-not-guilty-in-alleged-insurance-fraud-scheme/1343548405

Prosperident note — there is a Raymond Morales, formerly of Delano, CA, with date of birth June 25, 1956, who is a registered sex offender. We wonder if this is the same Raymondo Morales named in the article.

Employee accused of stealing from Cassville, MO dental practice

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The office manager of a local dentist’s office is accused to stealing over $10,000 from the dental practice that changed hands  to a new dentist in September 2017. According to affidavits of probable cause, the office manager of what was Dr. Carolyn Hunter’s, DMD, and then Dr. Jared L. Spears’, DDS, office took the money from cash deposits starting in December 2016 and continuing until June 2018.
                The Cassville Police Department investigated the case, and Dr. Spears reported the office manager, Karla Monte Wolf, was responsible for deposits, and between March 3, 2018, and June 28, 2018, $4,932.40 was missing from the deposits. Wolf allegedly admitted to taking the cash without permission.
                When interviewed by the Cassville Police Department on August 24, 2018, Wolf told officers she had been stealing money from Dr. Hunter, as well. An audit showed $10,195.50 missing from December 20, 2016,through August 23, 2018.  
                Wolf was charged with two counts of  felony stealing $750 or more on Nov. 5. She is currently being held in the Barry County Jail in lieu of a $30,000 cash, 10 percent or corp surety bond.

Content retrieved from: http://www.4bcaonline.com/employee-accused-of-stealing-from-cassville-dental-practice.html

Prosperident note: Ms. Wolf has an extensive criminal record. We wonder if Drs. Hunter and Spears were aware.

What do you do when you can’t steal from the dentist? Steal from patients!

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Arieta Gouvakis

ROCKY POINT, Long Island (WABC) — A Long Island dental assistant is under arrest, accused of stealing jewelry from patients.

Arieta Gouvakis, 38, worked as a dental assistant to Dr. Elliot Koschitzki at Long Island Implant and Cosmetic Dentistry in Rocky Point.

She is accused of removing jewelry worth between $1,000 and $3,000 from two patients who were being treated at the office under her care on January 31 and February 1.

The patients were in “twilight,” under Nitrous oxide, Suffolk County police Chief Stuart Cameron said.

Neither patient realized their jewelry was missing until after they left the office, according to authorities.

The Suffolk County Police Property Recovery Squad recovered the stolen jewelry from local pawn shops.

The dental office cooperated fully with the investigation once they were notified of the allegations.

Gouvakis was arrested at her home in Manorville at approximately 12:30 a.m. Friday. Authorities say she has prior arrests and that her motivation may have been to feed a drug habit.

She is charged with grand larceny and criminal possession of stolen property.

Dr. Nick Augenbaum, with the dental practice, said Gouvakis was hired only three weeks ago. She has since been fired.

“As soon as we were notified by our patients, we called the Suffolk County PD,” Augenbaum told Eyewitness News reporter Kristin Thorne.

He thanked Suffolk police officers for quickly recovering the patients’ stolen items.

Anyone with information or other patients who think they have also been victimized by Gouvakis are asked to contact the Seventh Squad at 631-852-8752.

Content retrieved from: https://abc7ny.com/dental-assistant-charged-with-stealing-jewelry-from-patients/5127540/

Embezzlement by A Spouse? Yes, it Happens!

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The conventional wisdom is that you are completely protected from embezzlement if your spouse runs your office.

While it is true that, in normal circumstances, your economic interest and that of your spouse line up perfectly, embezzlement can still take place even if your spouse manages your practice. In other words, most of the time, it would give your spouse no advantage to steal from your practice.

First, the embezzler may be someone other than your spouse, such as a receptionist or financial coordinator.

Second, there are times when your spouse’s interest is no longer harmonized with yours. The most common example is when they have decided to leave the marriage and simply haven’t told you this yet.

If your spouse is your employee (and therefore has no income that in independent of your control), they may have a need to put some money aside for the day when they tell you that they are leaving. Their expectation is that you will terminate their employment in this circumstance and they will have expenses for making new living arrangements and paying an attorney, all while deprived of their normal salary.

So embezzlement sometimes happens in this situation. The court case below shows an example of alleged embezzlement from a spouse in the context of divorce.

Stephanie Negron
Ross-v.-Negron-Ross

Look out for this person!

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Alexandra Counts-Thompson’s lengthy rap sheet has over 30 convictions, including several for embezzlement. Most convictions are from North Carolina and Virginia.

She is known to work in dental practices.

She uses several variants of her name including:

  • Alexandra Counts Thompson
  • Alexandra Nikole Counts
  • Alexandra N Counts
  • Alexandra Nicole Counts
  • Alexandra Nikol Thompson

We would urge extreme caution in dealing with this person.

Head of IT Department Accused of Embezzling $800k from California Non-profit Clinic

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The former head of information technology at the nonprofit North County Health Services, which provides services to low-income people, pleaded not guilty Friday to siphoning nearly $800,000 from the organization.

Hector Ramos, 55, was charged with 49 counts related to the loss of the money, which authorities said happened over the course of eight months in 2015.

The Murrieta man faces 36 years in state prison if convicted of all charges, said Deputy District Attorney Anna Winn.

During Ramos’ arraignment in a Vista courtroom, his attorney, Thomas Warwick, said Ramos was “a very credible individual,” and had “lived a blameless life for 30 years.”

Warwick declined comment after the hearing.

According to Winn, North County Health Services hired Ramos — at an annual salary of $200,000 — to run its IT department in January 2015.

Winn said that Ramos created two fraudulent corporations, then submitted false invoices from those corporations to North County Health Services.

Winn said that Ramos would create a sense of urgency by telling staffers in the purchasing department that the entire computer system might shut down if the invoices were not quickly paid.

Ramos’ assistant grew suspicious, investigated the two corporations and found that Ramos was on the board. The assistant reported it to organization officials, according to Winn.

Winn said bank statements revealed that while the payments were made to Ramos’ companies, the records do not show purchases of computer equipment or software to match what North County Health Services had been billed.

Rather, she said, the bank statements show “lavish spending,” including international vacations and thousands of dollars in purchases from a wine website. Other spending was on cigars, clothing, and a $44,000 check written to a Porsche dealer, the prosecutor said.

Several employees attended Ramos’ arraignment, but declined to comment after the hearing.

Winn said that the loss of the money “was very demoralizing” to the organization’s employees, and that they had suffered a sense of betrayal.

Superior Court Judge David Danielsen set Ramos’ bail at $1 million, and granted Winn’s request that, should Ramos make bail, he must prove that the source of the money was not illegally obtained.

Aside from the criminal case, the clinic’s insurance company filed a civil suit against Ramos in July to recover nearly $800,000. That case is pending.

Content retrieved from: https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/courts/sd-no-embezzle-arraignment-20171201-story.html

Connecticut Dentist has $18,000 Payroll Theft

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GRAFTON — A local dentist office reported the theft of $18,300 after a hacker instructed a payroll company to make a payment to an unauthorized bank account.

According to Grafton police, dentist Karen Deak of Deak DDS and Kramer DDS Inc., reported Monday that on Aug. 10, her son, Andrew Deak, also a dentist who works for the business owned by her and her husband, completed and emailed the company payroll request.

Karen Deak told police that unknown individual(s) then used her son’s email login and password to access the account and sent a request to Service 1st Payroll, 1008 Vivian Drive, Grafton, for a payment of $18,300. The payment request indicated the payment was for a subcontractor at 9:15 a.m. Aug. 10. By 11:18 a.m. the same day, another email was sent from her son’s account, once again requesting $18,300. On the second request, an IRS W-9 form was attached with the name “David Micheal David” with an address of “21 Weasel Road, Rolling Hills 82637.” No state was indicated. The bank information was used in the email for the transfer the funds to the Navy/Army Community Credit Union, Corpus Christi, Texas, police said. As indicated by the ZIP code, the address is in Glenrock, Wyo.

After the first attempt successfully received funds, a second attempt was made to have a subcontractor payment provided, this time in the amount of $23,900 to Bank of West in Casper, Wyo.

That is when the payroll company contacted Andrew Deak, who informed the employee that neither he nor his parents authorized payment of either $18,300 or $23,900.

Since the theft crossed state lines, the FBI was contacted, Grafton police said.

The case remains under investigation.

Content retrieved from: http://www.chroniclet.com/cops-and-courts/2017/08/24/Grafton-dentist-39-s-office-reports-more-than-18-000-stolen.html

Unhappy UK Dental Employee Steals from Practice

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A disgruntled dental nurse stole almost £4,000 from the practice where she worked – and spent it in Iceland .

When caught, Rebecca Seymour told police she couldn’t get the time off work she wanted, and didn’t like where she worked.

The 31-year-old, worked as a dental nurse for Genix Healthcare when she started helping herself to money.

She deleted random patient payments, took cash for herself and fiddled records, backdating payments to cover her tracks, Teesside Crown Court heard.

She thought the game was up when members of head office came to the Middlesbrough practice.

She left without explanation, believing they had arrived to investigate her at the two surgeries on Linthorpe Road.

In fact, it was her nervous behaviour and rapid departure which aroused suspicion, said Michele Turner, defending.

Iceland trip A manager found CCTV footage which showed Seymour in the surgery on a Sunday.

Prosecutor Harry Hadfield said: “She had no reason to be in the practice at that time.

“She had gone in to steal money from her employer.”

The audit trail revealed 164 transactions to the value of £3,997 over almost a year.

Seymour went to the police and confessed to taking the money, but said she was shocked at how much she had stolen.

She said she spent it straight away on shopping, “going to Iceland”, and was ashamed and sorry for her dishonesty.

She told officers she did not have money problems and her motive was dissatisfaction with her workplace.

She was not happy with the practice and believed less qualified people were earning more money than her.

“She said she felt undervalued. She didn’t like where she worked,” added Mr Hadfield.

“She couldn’t get the time off she wanted and she wanted to try and find employment elsewhere.”

New employers ‘might find out’.

Seymour, of College Road, Thorntree, Middlesbrough, admitted theft between May last year and April this year, her first conviction.

Ms Turner said Seymour showed obvious remorse for her crime.

She now had a new admin job and was doing well, but had not told anyone of her conviction because she was so embarrassed.

“They might find out,” said Judge Simon Bourne-Arton QC, the Recorder of Middlesbrough.

Sentencing, he said the theft was a “gross and obvious breach of trust”.

He told Seymour: “Over a period of nearly a year you were stealing from your employer.

“And you were doing so in a very well-organised manner.

“This was planned, it was well-executed and it was persistent.

“You took steps to cover your tracks so that you would not be detected, but eventually you were.”

She was given an 18-month community order with 140 hours’ unpaid work and a tagged curfew between 7pm and 6am.

Content retrieved from: https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/disgruntled-dental-nurse-stole-4k-13238401

Pennsylvania Woman Arrested for Stealing From Community College Dental Clinic

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A former employee of Luzerne County Community College was arrested today after money went missing from one of the departments at the college.


Eyewitness News was the only news crew there when Melissa Sue Taney turned herself into Nanticoke police on Wednesday.

 She had  No comment when we asked if she denied or admitted taking the money. .
Detectives say she stole nearly $8,000 from the Luzerne County Community College Dental Clinic.

 Taney worked as a receptionist-secretary at the clinic located in the Health and Sciences Building in Downtown Nanticoke. 

College students who are interested in a career in dentistry work on patients from the community to get hands-on experience.. Those patients pay a small fee for those services. 
Taney was in charge of taking cash payments..

 “She would receive cash from patients and then she would alter the documents to show that less money was taken and she’d pocket the remaining money,” explained Chief Tom Wall of the Nanticoke Police Department.

 “I think that’s a real tragedy,”  said Daniel Whitman, 

Daniel Whitman is taking summer classes at LCCC  

“I think it does put a black mark on the college but as long as they got it under control and is no longer part of it anymore we can keep going in a positive light.” 

Luetter Jacobs lives near the clinic. She wonders if there was some underlying reason for the alleged theft.

  “It’s a hard time you know and people are really struggling. They are taking what little they have to accomplish the bills and things like that.”

The President of Luzerne County Community College called it a violation of trust..and issued this statement which reads in part..  “We are committed to honest practices and won’t tolerate anything less which disrupts the confidence of the community and our students.” 
Investigators did not say why Taney allegedly stole the money. They say the alleged thefts took place in 2016 and 2017. 

Taney faces upto 10 years in prison if convicted.
     She is free on  her own recognizance tonight but would have to pay $75,000 dollars if she fails to show up for future court hearings.

Content retrieved from: https://www.pahomepage.com/news/i-team-dental-clinic-theft-investigation/1373659610