The Million Dollar Club -- Learn from Dentistry's Elite Embezzlers

Auto-generated transcript: The Million Dollar Club -- Learn from Dentistry's Elite Embezzlers

You are listening to the dental practice owner's podcast. Brought to you by Prosperident. From our unique perspective as dentistry's and bezel-lit experts, Prosperident's team can bring you the information that is important to practice owners. The dental practice owner's podcast brings you strategies, tools and tips that you can use, and dentistry's thought leaders as guests.

So sit back, relax, and listen to Prosperident's Amber Weber. Wendy Askins and David Harris, talk about the issues that matter to you.

Monthly power hour. Today we have a special group of individuals, all of our vaminers across Canada and the United States, have teamed up so that we can introduce all of you to the million dollar clubs. We want you to meet and bevelments at a week group. Thanks, Amber. In case you're wondering the third leg of our triangle, Wendy Askins is actually on assignment today.

So she won't be with us. It is just Amber and me as hosts. We're thrilled today to have some guest presenters, and we have five of them. And each of them is a Prosperident Investigator. They all bring different skills and attributes to the table. And we gave them each a very simple challenge. We said we want you to bring one of your most interesting cases

today and talk about it. So we'll tell you a little bit about these people, and then we're just going to turn the floor over to them to talk about their stories. And the first person is Sonja Hudson. Sonja lives in Ontario, Canada. She does a lot of our Canadian case files. And Sonja has been with us, gosh, I think at least at least a year. And I'm probably missing a couple that she'll set me straight.

Sonja is unquestionably one of the most organized people I have ever met. Her mind is just like this gigantic file cabinet. It's just amazing to watch. Our next examiner that is going to share his story tonight is Tony O'Brien. He is one of our U.S. examiners. He resides in Georgia. He is one of three supervising examiners with Prosperident. And I'll leave member of Prosperident's litigation support services team.

The interesting thing to know about Tony, he was one of the first people that helped me when I come on with Prosperident. And he is known to Prosperident as the data analysis with her. He is an Excel spreadsheet guru. So if you ever have an Excel question, he is the person to talk to about it. No doubt about that whatsoever. Next is Kelly Passen.

And Kelly is a little bit different in our team in this sense that almost everybody comes from a dental background. Kelly does not. Kelly's had a tremendously varied and interesting career. She's been a special agent for the United States government. She's worked in a sheriff's department. She was a fraud investigator for Nike, you know, the guys who make the shoes that my son buys.

She's really been in a lot of different facets of fraud investigation. She's also known nationally and internationally for her work in what's called pink color crime. And Kelly is a really celebrated in terms of her research and speaking about female and bezlers. And when we talk about dentistry, of course, we all know that the majority of the bezlers are female. Next is Pat Little.

He resides in Florida. The interesting thing about Pat is he is very well accomplished. He started his career as a practicing dentist. And he had two successful dental practices. From that, Pat continues to complete his education in accounting. And from there, he was able to be diversified in his clinical and dental experience and merge that with his financial knowledge in the dental world. So Pat is very, very qualified.

It's interesting all the facts and the things he knows from the clinical side to the business side. And he's just an all-around nice guy to boot last. And what by no means least Scott Clifford. Scott is another one of our supervising examers. So we have three levels of examiners called Fraud Examiner, Senior Fraud Examiner, and supervising examiner. Supervising examiners are the people that we give cases to that no sane person would accept. And I think Scott will will freely admit that.

Now, I'm just going to mention a little technical challenge with Scott tonight. Scott lives in Northern California. And if you watch the news and all you've heard that wildfires once again are a factor. And Scott was on warning for a couple of days that they were likely to have their electricity turned off. In fact, that has happened. Now, Scott's able to be worth us by phone. Scott is just an amazing investigator. And he really tackles some challenging files and comes out shining every time.

So first up tonight is Sonja Hudson. Sonja, when you're ready, let's turn on your video and tell everybody your story. Well, thank you, David, for those wonderful introductions, including mine. And let's get started. So basically, let me introduce you to Jennifer Leslie. Jennifer Leslie was a demo office manager in a multi office dental practice, who imbezzled over a half a million dollars in approximately three years. I was engaged to investigate and work with the regional police to put together a case.

And predominantly, it was to capture the methodology used as well as the total amount and bezzled. So let's talk about how Leslie did this. Well, she didn't have the normal access of what we see in most of our cases to the accounts receivable or the patient transactions and the dental practice management software. So what she did use was what she had access to. And you'll find that with in bezzlers that they will often find whatever means they can to perform the activity that they need.

So in her case, what she had access to was the accounts payable records. So this was a new case for me. One of the first ones I've done in the accounts payable side. So what she had actually done is she had set up suppliers and vendors in their account in software with names that the dentists would recognize. So they were legitimate names of suppliers and vendors. But many cases, the money is actually were directed into her personal bank account.

Another thing she did was she was in control of payroll and the bonus payment plans and often she overpaid herself on many occasions in this respect. So I had documented just over a half a million dollars in the three-year period. Okay, some of the warning signs and the symptoms that were identified. So the dentist was working as hard as ever

and his practices were running smoothly and he just didn't see the bank balance supporting the work that was being done. And often that's the first clue for Adenis is that there's not enough money in the bank and we're working hard that chairs are full and we don't have any explanation for that. Another symptom that we the dentist identified

was in the behaviors displayed by the suspect. So in her particular case, she had addictive and compulsive behaviors, gambling being one of them. She was also living beyond her means, vacationing, purchases, vehicles, all of that nature. So living beyond her means is definitely a flag for us. And one in particular with respect to her duties is that when she was away from the office,

she resisted having anyone cover for her and that her duties were held over until she returned. So if she was sick around vacation, she didn't want anybody covering her duties. So those were a few of the warning signs. Definitely there were a lot more but those were some of the ones that stood out in this particular case. Okay, some outside factors.

So you would think with it being an account's payable issue and you know, with the payables and the accounting software that the counts may have been prone to see this issue, but in this case they did not find the anomalies. And not through any fault of their own. They were seeing the payables being made to vendors and suppliers that they too may have seen repeatedly over the months and the years.

But they don't necessarily see where the money is going at the other end. So that it was something that you know, that's required some extra identification. So in this particular case, the bank security department had uncovered the fraudulent activity. They had reported it to the dentists and then the police were involved.

Now you would think, oh, everything should be good. Everybody should be able to do their job and carry on with this case. But actually, the police needed cross-bearance help. So we were engaged to help. And particularly, we spent our time documenting what was going on, the methodology that was used, as well as monetizing the total losses. And this was all necessary for them to build their case. They couldn't do it on their own, and they needed help doing that.

So a lot of times, even if it was the accountant to identify something or another party, prosperity helps put that together in a nice package, so that all the facts are gathered coherently into a document with everything you need to proceed with the case. So the outcome in this particular case, the suspect was charged. She was sentenced to two years in prison,

and then she will serve a three-year probation thereafter. So just to sum this up, basically what it comes down to is, if you feel something is not right, trust your intuition. If your spidey senses go off, luckily their correct and something needs investigating. You know, look into it deeper at your end. You could engage cross-bearer to do a more thorough examination,

but definitely if something feels off, don't ignore it. Likely, you know, something is going on. Another thing to be cognizant of is behavior of your staff in the office. So a lot of suspicions are recognized from the behaviors of the staff. If you're not sure what these behaviors or red flags would be, cross-bearer did offers a investment risk assessment questionnaire. You can request one of those, and when you complete that,

it'll identify whether you have something to be concerned about or not. So, you know, if you're not familiar with the signs, we have a whole list of those, and we can help you with that determination. Unfortunately, investment happens, and it can happen anywhere in your practice. It's not always going to happen in the front end of the office.

It could happen in the back end of the office, in this case. So, what the takeaway is from this particular case, is that if somebody wants to imbezzle, they will find a means to do it. So you need to be prudent, keep your eyes and ears open, you're finger on the pulse,

and that's about it. Thank you very much. Well, Sonia, great information. And just so everybody knows, we've asked one of the other, taking any or two on the panel with us to just have a minute or two discussion with Sonia. And in this case,

it's Scott Clifford, who, as I mentioned, is with us by phone. Scott, are you there? I am, can you hear me okay? Beautifully. All right. Sonia, my question for you on this case was, were all of the outgoing stolen money's electronic,

or did she steal any paper payment vehicles like outgoing checks or anything? Or was it just exclusive transfers out of the doctors accounts of her personal account? Great question, Scott. So in this particular case, most of the transactions were done through electronic means through an electronic fund transfer, Keith, provided by the bank,

which the suspect had full access to as part of her job duties. But that didn't mean she didn't cut checks and other methods for like payroll. She did do some payroll issues where she overpaid herself. So those in some cases were transferred, sometimes the bonus checks were, the bonuses were done in check.

So she did a little bit of both, but predominantly was electronic fund transfer. Perfect. Thanks, Scott. Okay, our next story is going to come from Tony O'Brent. So Tony, whenever you're ready and you have your camera ready, we're excited to hear your story. Hello.

Thank you, David and Amber for those very kind words. The case I would like to share with everybody is personally one of the most interesting ones that I've worked and my fraud and best to get in career. It involved a dentist and their spouse. And sort of the background is... The dentist was working as an associate with another practice and married a CPA. The CPA also had a small personal accounting practice on the side as well as worked as a

CFO for some other businesses. After about a year or so of marriage, the dentist's left, the practice she worked for, and then started her own practice. And so at that point, they became not only man and wife, but business partners as well. So the background that they established for themselves in the business was that the spouse, the CPA, was in charge of the accounting records as one might suspect, as well as preparing, delivering the deposits to the bank. And the expense side activity as well, paying the bills, accounting for all the money

is coming in and coming out. And sort of oddly enough, maintained a duplicate set of every patient's records inside of QuickBooks. And it was the handling of the expenses and the duplication of the patient records inside of the QuickBooks data that was one of the first red flags for the dentist. On top of that, the deposits, both in timing and in amount, didn't really make sense. And it was something that they noticed for a while, but didn't really say anything immediately, didn't raise the questions and the time, the fashion other than just kind of quietly

thinking to themselves. The timing was scrambled in a logical of the deposits, the amount of money coming out of the business accounts to various other purposes kind of raised some red flags. And it was a particular transfer that was around 175,000, that kind of was the straw that broke the camel's back there. And that's when some personal investigating took place and through that sort of personal investigation in number of other bank accounts were discovered. And then from there, kind of the magnitude of the situation, started to come into view,

at which point marriage became sort of not sustainable, as well as the business partnership. And so at a critical juncture, Prospera Deut was brought in, and an investigation into the accounting, both for their revenue side and the expense side took place. Fortunately, we were able to bring about a very positive outcome for our client, for the dentist and the expal, the exp business partner, and their activity kind of became known. And it was probably as good of an outcome and such a bad situation as one might hope for. The main takeaways here, and one of the reasons I chose this case to highlight, are, going back to what Song you said, you want to definitely trust your instincts.

If something feels off, there's a good chance that it is off. And second, the concept of trust is really something that is fluid in what I mean by that is it's something that has to constantly be reaffirmed. You can't just trust somebody at one point and then rely on that moving forward and thirdly, office policies, procedures, and terminal controls. They need to be followed by everyone. It doesn't matter if you're a spouse, if you're a dentist, or really, even if you're the owner, policies and procedures are in place.

They should be followed to the letter of the definition there and kind of all those three concepts tied together. Something feels off, it is and make sure that everyone is kind of follow the rules there. And with that, I'll kick it back to you out of here. Thanks, Tony. That was really an interesting story. I know Pat little, if you're available and you have your video ready, he has a couple questions for Tony about this case.

Great presentation, Tony. Very interesting case. I really find this interesting because I talk about this a little bit where I let you. A lot of the participants consider this a little bit like hard. They can't neglect over each other in small and I think they've had this come up to me and say, well, you know, my spouse gets everything anyway. So it's also sort of a lighthearted type of thing, but in your case, this wasn't like hard for the doctor.

And I was just wondering if the doctor ever discussed with you the emotionally impact that this had and how it might have affected the practice. That is a great question and because that's often times an overlooked aspect of these types of reach of trusts. And she did. This was a particularly hard time in their life and the idea of the breach of trust and the fallout from that was discussed and the impact really was immense because it was the depths of not only the deceit, but the quantity of money that was mishandled.

It was so both sort of the quantity and the quality, if you will, of this these schemes, shook that person to their core and, you know, I did my best to in having these conversations about the emotional aspect, to remind them that it wasn't their fault. They really cannot blame themselves for this. And trying to alleviate some of that blame to kind of mitigate some of the emotional distress that they were under. And I really, the reason why this case was so interesting to me was that it gave me a chance more so maybe than in other cases to help someone begin the process of piecing back not only

their life, but their emotional well-being. Because this weight heavily and the outcome that we could bring about, I think was really the end of that chapter and sort of the beginning of the next phase. And certainly encourage that person to do what was necessary to repair the dams rot on them so that they can trust again because I know that when you experience such a breach of trust, you might be hesitant to have another business partner or anything along those lines. Great story, guys. And very topical because, again, next month, we're talking about exactly that, how to get back the healing after stealing things. So Tony, thank you and Pat. And now I'd like to invite Kelly Paxton, who I

introduced a little bit earlier to join us and talk about a really interesting case. Thank you, David. My case is interesting. And that I came to the prosperity world a different way you heard that I was used to be a legal family. It was a federal agent for U.S. customs. I was armed 24-7. I got to drive fast cars and not get speeding tickets. And then, eventually I ended up at a local sheriff's office. I got me certified fraud examiner designation. And one of the things I'm kind of most of, it's the color crime is, I'm known as the Fra-Hash-Tak-Queen. So start today with honest people steal, hashtag on a people steal. And when I got to the sheriff's office and I started working on regular, I call it Main Street Investment Cases and

several of them named dentists just in my, you know, time at the sheriff's office.

It was eye opening to me because I was used to bad guys. And all of a sudden, I see primarily women, not all women, but primarily women who are stealing from mainstream businesses such as dental or orthodonic, prasic, practice. But it changed the whole way. I kind of looked at crime because I used to bad guys. So that's how I start this presentation off. The other thing I noticed when I was at the sheriff's office doing these embedded cases, it always starts small. And that was a little bit different from when I did, you know, federal law enforcement, they still bigger at one time. But when I was working Main Street Investment dental in Bezzlement Cases, it started small. It wasn't ever a check for a million dollars.

It wasn't even a check for $10,000. Then really started a small. And I think David probably appreciate this being a candidate. It kind of is like a graph like a hockey stick. So it may start with $10 and it may just hit $2 million dollars like Betty did in this case. And this is also what I mean by it starts small. We call this up shopping. When you will send your administrative assistant or office manager to Costco to buy gloves or PPE or things for the break room. And then you notice that they throw or you don't notice that they throw in like this $200 facial kit. Do you actually look at those receipts? And that's kind of a big way it could start small. I've seen cases when particular it started with three pairs of Costco jeans and she ended

up not until stealing $500,000. So it can start very, very small. And when it starts small, I really think you have to nip it in the butt because I have seen this all $10 go to hundreds of thousands of dollars. Again, hashtag gambling this pink cloud. Much like Sonia's case with Jennifer is Betty stole a million dollars over 10 years and Betty was a prolific gambler. And she also had the lifestyle. Betty's story was such that her husband had a good middle class job and then he had to become a bus driver. And their lifestyle did not change when his income dropped significantly. Betty found a lot of solace at the local casinos. And everyone at the dental practice knew that Betty liked to go to the casino and she liked to gamble. They also knew when she won.

Because she came back to the office, beaming. Just happy. And if she came back sad and angry and mean, that's because she lost because you know, as are built on customer losses, not customer winnings. So as far as paying attention to your employees, the mood swings from gambling are pretty huge. And if you know, you have an employee's at gambles and they've got good swings like that. I think you know that, you know, it isn't going so well for them. So much like Sonia's case, there was gambling and lifestyle. Betty had grandchildren that she liked to spoil quite a bit. And it just all caught us her. So Betty ended up getting five years. And what was really sad and they'll probably be discussed in next month, the healing after stealing is the dentist still missed Betty at the

sentencing Betty got five years. I asked him how he was. And he said he missed her and his wife almost clocked him. Because she had told me previously it was the hardest thing that she and her husband had gone through as a couple. And that he said, you know, Betty made life really easy for him. She made life easy for the height of the dentist. But she made life really, really easy for the dentist. So that was Betty's story. And unfortunately, the sad part of Betty's story is she passed after doing her five years in prison. And I really think, you know, numerous people who go prison, their life expectancy is cut short. So I think Pat is asking questions. No, Tony, sorry, Tony. What questions do you have? Yes, that is a fascinating story. And what I was wondering

as I was listening to you tell that is kind of a two-part question. What other than the mood swings, what other type of warning signs did the dentist see? And then did the dentist's emotional attachment to that employee sort of cloud their ability to objectively view the situation in your opinion? Yeah, I'll do the second one first. Betty was part of the dentist's family, not the, you know, figuratively speaking. She went, she worked for a long time, obviously, over 10 years. And she went to the family's children's graduations, weddings, graduation from college. She was literally part of the family. And the dentist also said, had I known that she needed the money. I would have helped her out. Now, I don't think he would have given her a million dollars. But, you know, he, he was incredibly

generous. And then the first part of the questions is, far as her mood swings, she would be very, very generous when she wanted the casino to the hygienist. She come in and they were embarrassed by some of the sort of expensive gifts that she would give them because, you know, how could you afford that? But then she'd say, well, I did well. They could see no over the weekend. But then the mood swing when she didn't do well, you know, she got nasty. I will say she was nasty to the hygienist. But she always kept the dentist kind of isolated from any of that drama. Well, next up is going to be our original dentist, Mr. Pat Little, if you're ready to go, ready to hear your story.

Thank you, David. I want to introduce you to Keil. Keil was a very good ambassador. It turned out that she was also just about as good at lying. And through her lies and her resource will just be enabled her to commit an investment over a long period of time. I will say this case. She has been charged criminally.

It is pending a trial. So everything I'm going to talk about is related to this case. We should still consider that as a list. I'm going to start with, I'm going to say Dr. One. This was the original doctor that Keil worked with. She had been with the doctor for about 10 years. And was doing such a great job. The doctor trusted her with everything.

He admits now that he didn't look at anything. He just completely trusted. And what that enabled her to do though, is she was able to commit an investment in a multiple ways. One is what we call revenue side, which means she was able to commit an investment through the practice of management software. But she was also a bookkeeper. And through that, she was able to also commit an investment through the expense

of the bill. And she was smart enough not to impose also much that the doctor thought anything was wrong. He got the first win, but something might be wrong when it's CPA. Call them and said something's wrong with your accounts received. He had no idea why. So he asked him, let's meet after work today. And let's just discuss what's going on.

And he's still not suspected of things. But when she went to lunch, she emailed him a resignation. And I think that was the doctor's first clue that something might not be right. So he contacted us. And at that point, we conducted an exam. And this and does what turned out to be nearly half million dollars. So it was a very painful thing for the doctor. Obviously she was terminated.

And so the doctor's credit, he is called a criminal complaint. And as I said, now she is the waiting trial. So at that point, my job is pretty much done. At least until I needed to be an expert witness of it ever. So that's two years later, second doctor, I was just going, this is doctor two. When I interviewed her, she had mentioned that she also had no idea anything was wrong in her practice. But in this case, she was tip 125 her treatment coordinator. And the treatment coordinator suspected that the officer manager might be up to something suspicious.

As a result, when I took a look, sure enough, I discovered a cash theft. And thankfully, this was called early enough that it wasn't a large loss for that this doctor. But it was still a devastating thing that the doctor went through. But she was grateful to the treatment coordinator who had shown that she was a great employee of that time. So the treatment coordinator was promoted to the officer manager. And of course, she probably already know who that treatment coordinator was. It was kill. So, kill the true, proved to be quite mobile.

She was a doctor one. She had a short step as a dental consultant and then ended up the treatment coordinator for the second doctor. The problem there is that the treatment coordinator, she didn't have access to the financials. So she took it upon herself to find something with the officer manager. So, kill was responsible for getting the officer manager terminated. She becomes the new officer manager. And a year later, everything seemed to be going fine. And what happened now is again, the doctor had no idea anything was going on.

So she signed up for an employee at Symposium in Las Vegas. And she took the key members of her dental team to this symposium. She got a frantic phone call from KELM and said, I'm not going to be able to make the symposium. U.S. immigration has denied my interest into the United States. And again, a very shocking thing for the doctor to hear. And if we she asked KELM why, what's going on? This is where she proved how good of a liar she had been.

Actually for a number of years. But she told this doctor, well, Dr. One has been charged with interest fraud. And he is about to be charged crimly. And I made a witness to this trial. And I guess that's why they detainably. And the doctor bought it. But obviously at that point, those she called.

And through conversation with David, he was able to put it to and to together. So I got rehired to see Dr. Two. So I ended up because of KELM investigating three different cases. And so it's, this is just going to show how dedicated somebody can be when they really feel the need to steal. Especially if they're resourceful, they have financial knowledge. And they're also pretty good at lying. So what I want to leave you with is why it's so important to review resumes. Talk to the prior employers.

Obviously background checks can be helpful. In this case, a background check would not have been as effective because KELM has not been convicted yet. But it's still a step to take. But it's vital. You must be able to check with former employers. No matter what she says. Because it turned out that when KELM first came to work for this doctor as a treatment coordinator, she specifically said, please don't call Dr. One because he's in some little bit in control.

And it would probably just best if you didn't get involved in the course doctor too, said that sounds reasonable and didn't call Dr. One. Plus at the time, she was not having a financial responsibility. So she thought it's pretty safe to hire anyway. And then, of course, when she was promoted to office manager, it never occurred to the doctor to check former employers. So please trust your team, but verify everything. And if you're not sure how you conduct a good resume search,

we can certainly help you out in that regard. Fantastic story pattern. The fact that you did it three times is amazing. I know Kelly's going to ask you a couple questions about that case, KELY. So, Pat, Dr. One, did she start stealing right away or did it? Did you know when she started stealing a Dr. One? We don't know the exact time she started stealing, but going back through records,

it looks like she started stealing pretty much as soon as she started to work. So she'd been with the doctor for nearly 10 years. And I got fresh evidence going back five years, but then subsequently it became evident that it looks like she had been stealing for quite a long time, step. So that's one of the things if I see someone that has starts to steal within six months at a new position, they've done it somewhere else.

So it makes me think that she, who did she work for before Dr. One, she may have stolen to that person also. We'll call him Dr. Zero. He's just zero. Actually. And so it took her about six months to get access to the cash side of the Dr. Two is that correct? Yes, she has started out with access to the practice major somewhere.

So that was obviously the first avenue for the investment. Then obviously as she worked, she appeared to be a great employee. She gained the doctor's trust, so then the checkbook was turned over to her and then actually she stopped part of this particular case. But he was so impressed with her. He actually has another business on the side. She became the bookkeeper for that business. And it was certainly found by another investigation not through us.

But there was an illegal activity, we'll say, with that other business as well. I have only had one victim in all my time doing in settlement cases that disliked their employee, only one. And even with that, he said he never gave her access. She still managed to steal $450,000. So yeah, this sounds like it's not her first or second run, you're possibly her third. I would agree 100% with that. Whether there's a wheel, there's a light.

Yes, thank you. I'll add a personal note here if I could. I got the call from Dr. Two who I knew already. And Dr. Two called me to discuss the situation in her office and was describing the A-Anzacso for office manager. And I knew the Dr. Two and Dr. One lived in the same city. And I asked Dr. Two, this her name came and Dr. Two just about fainted when I asked that question and said, how the hell did you know that?

And anyway, I had kind of put the two and two together. And that's what that's what said Pat, if I can put it this way. To see Dr. Two for investigation, free. How's that? Absolutely. All right, thank you Pat. So we do have Scott Leverd. And all right, the case that I want to talk to you guys about tonight is a very interesting

and compelling case for me because the densest that is involved is just one of the kindest most compassionate people that I've ever got the opportunity to work with. And I can tell that from the first call. She was just a fantastic person. And she got into dentistry later in her life for all the right reasons. She wanted to help people. She wanted to help not just patients and do good dental work for people. But she also wanted to build a successful business where she could employ people

and help other people along the way. The decision for her to go into dentistry was done for all the right reasons. And the person that she hired the office manager, Danielle Powers, was a friend of hers. She was trusted. And everything worked out fine for the most part as far as the doctor was concerned. They were building a good practice. They had good report, good patient base. But there were some things that she noticed on her day sheets that she really wasn't quite clear

on. And as a new dentist, you the office manager, what's going on. And the office manager always had a good reason for things. There was always a good excuse or a good story that she was telling. And the doctor really didn't think much of it. But there was just something in the back of her head that told her that something was wrong. And finally when she discovered some real anomalies, she contacted Prosperitan. And that's when we spoke.

And I asked her during the call. I said, how much did you discover? How much do you think was really taken in this scenario? And she kind of hesitated. And the answer was about $20 to $30,000. And she was just devastated that amount. And I think that's really the powerful part about this case. Because by the time I ended up finishing the case, we had over $4 million in theft.

And once I countered it all up, and had to make that phone call to the clients, let or know, it was one of the most difficult phone calls I've ever had to make in my career. Because not only was the impact much, much greater than she thought. But the dollar amount that I came up with almost exactly matched the total that she still owed on her dental school. And you could hear this kind sweet compassionate person turn into a very angry, very vengeful person. She really, really wanted to go after this suspect with everything that we possibly could.

So we're prosecuting criminally in. She's also filed a civil complaint with her. She was actually present at the arrest. She really wanted to get photographs and watch this in Vesler go down. She was very happy that there was an arrest. The case right now is still pending. I think we have a court date coming up in a couple of weeks. She's out on her own record as in right now.

But she is in big trouble with this jurisdiction. Another email that the client sent to me later was of this. This is actual cash money that was given to her in return for services rendered. And she was just so happy because she knew that she was going to be able to keep all of that. If we hadn't have done what we did in Cot, Danielle, in her actions, there's a good chance that most, if not all of this money would not have found its way into my client's bank account. So she's moving forward now.

She's got a great attitude about it. She knows what to look for. She knows what answers are viable answers when she asks questions of her new front office person. And she knows how to check things. It's a trust but verify. You know, that phrase, phrase a lot around prosperity and it is trust but verify. And so she's moving forward and everything's good.

And we'll hopefully let you know on our wall of shame how the court case turns out. Thanks, Scott. Over to you, sign up. Okay. Scott, that's a very interesting case. It's a very sad when we hear stories about that and we all have our share of those sad stories. What are the questions I always have?

And we don't always get to hear about it is, is there a possibility for any restitution in this case of the doctor getting any of that money back? It always, it always pains me to, you know, whether there's restitution, especially when the amounts are that high. What did she, so two parts, what did, did you find out what she used the money for? Is the money gone or is there anything that can be recovered in any kind of way or? The case is still pending both, both civil and criminal. And so.

We're not sure what we're going to be able to squeeze out of that turn up. We do know that she did get some recovery from her employee dishonesty insurance, which is good. But the fact that they're going after civilly, as well as criminally, I mean, a criminal or a institution order is one thing. But you know, a lot of times, you can eat a little bit more recovery out of that. I'm not sure if the money is still available or has tied up in other assets. But yeah, that's a great question.

Okay. Yeah, that's about it. That was great case, Scott. I feel really sad when I hear stories like that, but most of our stories have, you know, when we find investment, I mean, it's always a sad time. When we don't find investment, I mean, we feel happy, but at least, you know, they have some kind of a degree of comfort knowing it's not going on or it is going on. So thank you.

Thanks, Sonia. And Scott, yeah, you know, there's a tragedy behind every investment. I'll just go back to something, Scott, so if it's second to go, essentially, when investment happens, every dentist gets something back. Whether they get everything back or not depends on the factors. And one of the other things that comes across in these stories and it came clearly with Scott's, when people confess that they confessed to fur lists and they actually stole and I remember and I were interviewing a suspect this morning.

And she, Amber Astor, like how much do you think you've stolen? And I think the number she gave Amber was around $25,000. And her investigations not finished yet, but, you know, we're closing in on 100,000 for sure. Yeah. All right. So some great stories and I'll have some great storytellers that I've seen this presentation before and it was still captivating for me.

So let's just look at our kind of global takeaways from this. And then once that's done, we'll kind of open it up to question and answer from the audience. So the interesting thing that for each story with this is that's really reminding me of what the audience says, if you have that, by default, go with your gut. You know, if something doesn't seem right, follow your intuition and really stop and evaluate and ask a professional for help. I think that's a key thing with those with your intuition, don't think you're going to do the deep diving and discover it on your own.

Absolutely. And I'll go back to something that Tony said, you know, the way humans approach trust is kind of the risk. It meets somebody and you normally decide fairly early in their relationship, whether that person is trustworthy or not. And then what we want to do is lock that up in a closet and never, ever open that closet door again. And, you know, we think for example that we should be able to trust our spouse in general

that's true. However, their events and divorces is pretty high on the list where the economic interest of your spouse suddenly diverge. I've got to call this morning from a dentist and just in the process of going through a divorce and this spouse is still working. And my question to the dentist was, well, how much sense does that make? Okay. So, pressure and is either financial or emotional.

So I always tell people that, you know, there's always outside influences that can cause people to go down and choose an ethical path. But realistically, it's the road of opportunity and what that road looks like that control how they do it, meaning how much they get away from it, is that a bumpy road or smooth sailing, nice new, new pay-brown. So, you know, there's always going to be a pressure there, but realistically it's the opportunity that is open to these people who have that internal urge to complete this task that's going to determine how much they're going to commit this crime.

Yeah. And this came out from something that Kelly said. One of the interesting things about in Bezel and the differentiates it from a lot of other crime is that you have a series of crimes, a whole series of small crimes against the same victim. You know, a car that you don't keep stealing cars from the same person, being with one. But in Bezelman happens in small amounts. They grow over time, but you're still talking hundreds of dollars perhaps for a doctor,

maybe even a balance of just like not millions. And over time, those small thefts can add up to a lot of money. Well, and I'd like to add something about that too that Kelly said is, you know, she kept that road of opportunity open because she kept the dentist happy too. So they realize that opportunity and really try to keep that well managed, like, so that's not as suspicious. Yeah, absolutely. They're smuggled right up to the doctor's family.

Mm-hmm. So stealing is often discovered by accident, meeting a lot of times, then it's don't even have that intuition. And maybe a team member that comes to you or years later, you're a accountant or you hire a new person that sees something that doesn't seem right. So a lot of times, just because something doesn't feel like this out of place, doesn't mean something isn't going on that you're not aware of. Absolutely.

And, you know, there have been studies done that show that roughly 80% of a vessel that is found by what I'm going to call them as luck. And the other 20% happens through the control systems that put people in place. I think a couple of things come out about one is that we probably need better control systems and a lot of practices that we have. But in the cold light of day, most of the vessel is uncovered by some kind of chance occurrence. And if you think about pasties, you know, dentist number two found out about the time

she had taken away at her friend, Jessica, because I guess her name. And again, this is something that a lot of dentist will miss on that. I know this about you guys, you all hate the process of hiring people. The thought of sitting there went 30 resumes and getting down to the 3-1 interview, then pick the one you want to hire. You can't stand. that and like any job you hate, if somebody offers you a shortcut, you take it. And again, in past case, Dennis number two never called Dennis number one. If that phone call had happened,

Kim never we got in a job with Dennis number two. So no matter what happens, no matter what somebody says to you, don't skip that one. So the last key point, and I like to use this this fun little story, if you wake up and you see dust everywhere, what makes that dust settle, have to have some rain and the wind has to die down. So that's the important of making sure that everything is calm and settled in your practice, know the details, record file, don't wait for a start storm to come through to help you settle your dust and realize the damage that has occurred. So that's the importance of really reconciling, know what goes in, know what comes out, and know all the details. And like I said, if you need help setting up a system, don't be afraid, you know,

to ask others for help on how do I keep the dust settled in my practice? Absolutely. I just want to mention some resources for people. First of all, there's us in our doors wide open to you. If you have concerns, if you want to talk about how you can protect yourself against investment, we'd love to talk to you. I'd also like to mention our whole machine. This is a place where we collect stories like the ones we've told you today. The whole machine is searchable, so you can look by city or by state or by last name. We put as many pictures of these people as we can find because sometimes they apply using a different name or something. It's kind of entertaining, reading sometimes, and also some some good information. We've got

more than a few calls over the years from a doctor. We said, yeah, I was looking around in your polished name, and I saw my office manager's picture. So that's a great resource. And we don't ask for much error, but one resource that we would like is if you enjoyed tonight, please leave us a five-star rule review. If there are audience questions, we'd love to tackle them right now. We had a person from our audience at a question to Sanya. Sanya, you mentioned lawns that lawn for us, and we had her conduct a forensic exam. Do they hire or pay the DA for the investigation since it would normally be for them, or did the doctor so hire for you? So she's wanting to know what we paid our bill. Yeah. So basically we were engaged by the dentist.

So I took most of my direction from the dentist. He authorized me to deal directly with police, but anytime there was any extra services being provided that required additional over and above payment of our regular services I would contact the dentist. Our report was provided to the dentist, but definitely to keep in mind that it was going to be used for police for the case. There was a preliminary action that we took with police because we had to get a production order. David in the US, that's called a warrant. So Pena. Sorry. So we had to get an out-production order or subpoena to obtain bank records for the suspect. So we had to do a lot of work in order to get that approved by the judge. So that was extra services that we did that we got approval from the

dentures to do. And then after that, all the services that we rendered were just billed to the dentist. And the report was provided to the dentist and the police used our report when they were pursuing the charges to them. All right. And maybe something I'll ask you of all our question.

What was it like working with the police? I mean, what did you take away from that experience? Because I know you've done a lot of investigations, but that was really the closest you, you know, the most incidentally you've worked with the police. Yeah, they were they were excellent to work with. They really needed a lot of guidance. So they kind of just would tell me basically what they were looking to do and then I had to formulate a plan in order to satisfy and present something to them that was going to be suitable. But there was a lot of back and forth. But you know, the police don't always know all the insights and outs of an investigation and all the details that we have to put together and follow through. So, you know, it was it was a lot of work on our part, but you know,

definitely I kept in mind everything the objectives that they were trying to achieve and make sure that we we matched what they were looking to be done. So basically, yeah, that was the first case I had done. So intensely with the police, but it was good experience and I actually pulled up with the detective just this week before tonight's webinar. Just to touch base with them and see how things are going and where they're at with the case. So they're very forthcoming with information and, you know, they're still happy to deal with prosperity and he was looking forward to, well, maybe not looking forward to, but if you ever needed to work with our services again, yeah, what people don't always appreciate is how technical a crime is this and, you know,

the people in police departments especially small police departments really can't specialize in commercial crime and, you know, when Kelly Passen was a, it was a investigator for the sheriff's department. You know, they were incredibly fortunate to have somebody of your knowledge level. And most most police departments even their side ones just don't have that. And then when you move from investigating kind of white collar crime in general to dental and bezel, and specifically, you know, you, you escalate the problem whole other level. We think about the things and, our audience members are familiar with with all this stuff I'm talking about, you know, the interplay between dental insurance and what patients they, and the nuts and bolts of practice manage this

software, all those things. I mean, an investigator who's good at other white, other types of white collar crime can be just lost in them. Kelly, I don't know if you, because you have anything to add in terms of, you know, how challenging this kind of investigation really can be. Well, I always say cops don't become cops to play with pitifuls. What are the practice management software? And if they do, they're probably an IRS agent. So, that's... That is challenging for them. And the other thing, one of the things that I bring up when I have a victim is that there is no CSI and bezel

bit. And I just talked to a victim over the weekend, not of a dental and bezel, but a million dollar parent getting ripped off. And they are so disappointed in the justice system because it took so incredibly long. So one of the things that I really like to say, I'm a fraud therapist,

and I'm also sort of the liaison between law enforcement and the victim. Because a lot of victims really, they've never dealt with law enforcement before. So I kind of bridge the two. I know what they need. The other thing that is sort of my latest one is if you walked into your home,

and you saw a dead body, would you touch it? And I think no one out there would probably touch it, but you walk into an investment. And oh dear, there's just, they're messing up with the evidence. It is a crime scene. And you need to remember, it is a crime scene and you do need professionals.

So even though we don't have a dead body, it still is a crime scene. And that's a little bit. And one thing Kelly has built on that, that surprises a lot of people is just how manly slowly the justice system works. And Pat, I know you encounter this in your story about camp because I forget the exact chronology,

but camp was fired by Gendys number one. I'm thinking three to four years ago from now.

And she's still not jail. She still has been going to trial. It's actually been a little over four years now. Yeah. And we all understand that COVID has kind of grounded the court system down. I was trying to explain to somebody this morning that the challenge they're having a jury trial

and finding a courtroom where you can keep called jurors six feet apart from each other. And from everybody else. So COVID has slowed down the court system, but let me tell you, we did move very quickly before. So I'm just on one of your pal Jennifer. I'm trying to think of the chronology there. And it was two minutes.

One of the last ones I've ever seen. Yeah. It was. And I'm not sure how we got it done. So quickly, I think the police had a really good appetite for that one based on the amount that was under consideration, as well as maybe the dentist was on them a little bit more than typically to get this result.

But once they made the decision, she was picked up by think cap of order. She was crossing the border and they picked her up and she was charged. And things happened relatively quickly. Like, at the case, I say under a year. Yeah. I think in large part that was because you did such a

thorough professional job with the homework. And it was, it was a deep and a police to process when you're done your work. Yeah, definitely because, I mean, I didn't want to be the slow linkage in there. I wanted to get things done quickly and off my plate. And there was a lot of back and forth.

But yeah, once it was done, it was, yeah, they acted on it relatively quickly. Yeah, I have one. I'll just remember asked this and it relates to stop case. What best practices do you recommend to try cash that a front officer sees for a patient? And it happens frequently.

Um, one of the great tools that you have is actually your practice management software. Um, you know, when you're sitting in your office or even when you're at the back, you can always run a quicky day sheet throughout the day to see what cash is coming through. Because oftentimes, you know, patients want receipts for calf payments.

And so they need to get entered correctly, originally the first time in a lot of cases. And then they get manipulated and stolen from there. And so you've got your audit trail in your software. Hopefully you have a good audit trail and different practice management software present the day to differently.

But, you know, and then there's just, you know, visuals. You know, when you look around your office, if you see a paper receipt, look, you know, what is that there for? If you see somebody working with Excel or Word, that doesn't really have a reason to, they could be, you know, creating copies of receipts, things like that that they can give to patients.

So you really want that original entry to go in the software correctly the first time. And then the receipts generated for the patient out of the software, not out of any external program or an external book anywhere. But, you know, keep track of it throughout the day. And there's even some, you know, external services. You know, practice metric services

that what will actually text you whenever a cash payment is entered into your software. You know, things like that can always help. But, you know, just be on alert because cash is very tempting for even the honest person to, to abscond if, if nobody knows they're doing it. And that turns them automatically into a dishonest person by nature.

But, you know, and there's a lot of different demographics in her very cash heavy. Some offices might see only, you know, half a percent or 1 percent of their total payments coming in cash where other offices depending on the location, the demographics and the type of work that's around, you know, might see six to seven percent of their total payment being cash payments.

You know, so just just watch it and also understand cash isn't the only thing to get stolen. You know, we've had some cases where all the cash went into the bank correctly and it was something else that got stolen. Right. Right.

Right. I'll add something to that. COVID has given every practice of perfect excuse to not take cash anymore. You know, as dentists move to a more contactless office set up, that's the chance to say, look, we just, you know, because of COVID, we just can't accept cash anymore. You know, cash is, and scots, right?

I mean, either thieves will certainly take other things. But cash is the first choice of everything. You know, it's the most mobile, most volatile thing that you have. So in my mind, as long as this is presented properly and of course communicated. advance so you can't have people showing up at appointments with cash ready to pay only to find out that you know cash is no good here anymore. But to me, COVID's the perfect excuse not to take cash now. If if your practice of Scott says, you know, is in firm country that maybe a huge challenge if you

have an urban practice, it shouldn't be a problem. Yeah. One more question from our audience, our payment deletion common. I don't we ask Tony to comment on that, Amber. He somehow managed to say space, they silenced through this discussion. Well, I think they should it be, but it depends in part on the practice management software because people do make mistakes. You're you're keen to stuff in and you're going fast and you put the check number in the check amount field when you're keen and in some practice management or software's and make it easy to go in there and kind of modify a payment once it was entered. Some, either if they don't or maybe my personal preference, kind of provide for that payment to be deleted and then re-entered. So ultimately it shouldn't be

common as we understand that word typically. If it is, that means you have either someone with a poor or product, they're making a lot of mistakes and having to fix them or there is something that needs to be built into. They will have an on occasion and that's why it's good at the end of a day and a week if you can pump open an audit trail, depending on the practice management software and just kind of keep an eye to establish what is a baseline level for your staff and then you can kind of peg that against any fluctuations determine if it's something that you should look into. Perfect. Can I add something to that? Yes, sir. The only thing that I would add to that is the deletion should always be looked at to see what was re-entered. You want it, you know, the

deletion doesn't necessarily mean anything by itself. It's what got re-entered that is the important part. I can't get into two by detail in this particular forum but you really want to look at that, what was good back in after the deletion? Right, sir. From both of you. And we do have an update on Scott's case. Here it is. The doctor has one of civil suit against Miss Powers and was awarded a judgment for over $1 million. The doctor will pursue a wage garnish when it's allowed to happen. And the criminal case goes in front of a grand jury last week. Her next week, sorry. So Scott mentioned both a civil and a criminal action there and you just kind of update on both of them. So that one was a tremendous case and a real feather in Scott's cap and one where we take some

pride in. So I'd like to thank our guest panelists and of course my terrific host Amber. Thank you all for being with us and telling some great stories and I really didn't know how good story tell or saw us work so we we may call on you guys again in the future. But thank you for being a part of our audience and we look forward to seeing you next month. So thank you everybody. Have a great night and be safe. Hi. Thanks a lot everybody. Thanks for listening to the dental practice owner's podcast brought to you by Prosperidant. You can contact Prosperidant through its website www. Prosperidant.com or by calling 888-398-2327. If you have questions about this podcast if you would like to discuss your practice or there is a topic you would like to see in a future podcast

we would love to hear from you. Amber, Wendy and David will be back soon with another episode.