A nursing assistant stole $7,700 from a dead man and his 100-year old widow, cops say
A certified nursing assistant used her jobs at an assisted living facility this year and an in-home caregiver in 2017 to steal $7,775.43 from a St. Petersburg elderly couple, according to police and the Florida Department of Health.
Lethea Rich, 28, faces three counts of scheme to defraud. Prosecutors decided against charging Rich with one count of uttering forged checks.
The health department dropped an emergency restriction order on the certified nursing assistant license Rich gained in 2015. Rich can’t be a CNA in a situation that would give her access to a patient’s financial information or any payment method.
What follows comes from the emergency restriction order and the arrest report by St. Petersburg police:
Back in April 2017, Rich swiped the checkbook of W.B., a resident under Rich’s care at Carrington Place, a St. Petersburg nursing home. W.B. died Nov. 10, 2017.
Jump forward to March of this year. While working for Tampa Bay Temps, Rich was sent to Westminster Suncoast Rehabilitation Facility and assigned to D.B., a 100-year-old woman and W.B.’s widow. The day before being assigned to D.B., Rich went into the woman’s cabinet, found her purse and lifted a debit card and six checks, according to the document.
Two days later, March 5, Rich used the debit card at a Publix for a $220.67 purchase. A day later, March 6, she racked up $712.38 in two purchases at a Target.
Rich deposited the six checks on D.B.’s Regions Bank account into her own TD Bank account over two different three-check sets in April that totaled $2,047 and $2,307. She also deposited a hat trick of checks from W.B.’s checkbook that she stole in 2017, three forgeries worth $2,489.38.
This led to a negative balance in D.B.’s Regions Bank account, not something her daughter expected to see on April 21. Regions told W.B.’s daughter six checks were written on D.B’s account to Rich. E.S. called the St. Petersburg police. Rich was arrested June 19.
The emergency restriction order said a detective asked Rich why she did it.
“I did not have any money and I wanted some stuff for my baby,” the ERO says she replied. “I knew what I did was wrong and knew it was going to catch up with me.”
This story was originally published August 8, 2019 at 12:38 PM.
