For one Washington State woman, trying to get away with workers compensation proved a bad call.
The Lynnwood woman must repay Washington State more than $200,000 for workers comp benefits she received fraudulently.
Sharon Jean Weaver, 64, had claimed she was too disabled to work while operating an adult family home at the same time. She pleaded guilty in Snohomish County Superior Court recently to one felony count of first-degree theft, according to the Washington Attorney General’s Office.
Along with being ordered to repay the money to the Department of Labor & Industries (L&I), she was sentenced to 30 days in jail.
Defendant Reported Neck and Back Injuries
According to court papers, Weaver was a Department of Social and Health Services (DSHS) caseworker when she fell as she left a client’s home, injuring her neck and back in March 2001. She filed a workers comp claim, and began receiving wage-replacement checks from L&I.
Two months later, Weaver began operating an adult family home, known as “Rose Manor,” out of her residence at the time in Edmonds, court documents said.
According to an L&I investigative report, she listed herself as president and provided various caregiver duties, including transferring patients between beds and commodes, and bathing and dressing them.
Weaver received a total of $203,594 from L&I off and on from March 2001 to August 2010 in wage-replacement checks, vocational rehabilitation services and a disability settlement.
At the same time she was operating her business, she was submitting official forms to L&I verifying she wasn’t working, and was incapable of working, because of her on-the-job injuries.
A physician had been certifying at the time that Weaver’s injuries were serious enough to warrant receiving wage-replacement payments, but later told an L&I investigator that he wouldn’t have done so had he known she was operating the adult family home.
DSHS revoked Weaver’s adult family home license in 2011 for several violations.
Author Kori Shafer-Stack, Editor, Amaxx Risk Solutions, Inc. is an expert in post-injury response procedures and part of the Amaxx team helping companies reduce their workers compensation costs by 20% to 50%. www.reduceyourworkerscomp.com. Contact: kstack@reduceyourworkerscomp.com.
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