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TRENTON
– Attorney General Paula T. Dow and
Criminal Justice Director Stephen J. Taylor
announced that a Union County minister was
sentenced today for falsely completing,
signing and submitting a Medicaid application
on behalf of an elderly parishioner.
According
to Acting Insurance Fraud Prosecutor Riza
Dagli, Kevin Clark, 54, the pastor of Bethel
Baptist Church in Westfield, was sentenced
to 60 days of house arrest and 100 hours
of community service as conditions of a
term of three years of probation by Superior
Court Judge Stuart Peim in Union County.
He was also fined $5,000. The sentence was
based on Clark’s guilty plea to Medicaid
fraud and tampering with public records.
The charges were contained in a Nov. 10
superseding Union County grand jury indictment.
In
pleading guilty on Jan. 25, Clark admitted
that on Nov. 17, 2004, he knowingly and
falsely completed, signed and submitted
a Medicaid application on behalf of an elderly
parishioner. The Medicaid application required
Clark to list the sale of all real property
by the parishioner and any cash given away
by the parishioner within the past three
years. Clark admitted that he failed to
list on the Medicaid application that the
parishioner had sold a parcel of real property
for $183,038. He further admitted that cash
from the sale of the real property was given
to him.
Sergeant Patricia Yellen and Deputy Attorney
General Yvette Gibbons were assigned to
the investigation. Gibbons represented the
Office of the Insurance Fraud Prosecutor
at the sentencing.
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