SIOUX FALLS WOMAN SENTENCED IN MEDICAID FRAUD CASE 

PIERRE, S.D. – Attorney General Larry Long said today that Monica M. Lemme, 28, Sioux Falls, was sentenced on September 8, 2004, in 2nd Circuit Court for one felony count of Making a False Claim to the Medical Assistance Program (Medicaid). Lemme received a suspended imposition of sentence on the condition that she pay restitution in the amount of $13,686.22 to Medicaid, court costs of $55.00, serve sixty days of jail time and satisfactorily complete three years of probation. 

A Minnehaha County grand jury indicted Lemme in May on several Medicaid Fraud related charges. Lemme, a Medicaid beneficiary, was obtaining controlled substances from approximately 32 different physicians and from 18 different pharmacies in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. She deceived physicians by reporting that her medications were lost or stolen, that she would be out of town and needed additional medications, and that she was using only one provider when in fact she was using multiple providers to obtain the controlled substances. This case was prosecuted by the Attorney General’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit and investigated by the Division of Criminal Investigation and the Office of Inspector General. 

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