A 44-year-old Delray Beach property manager is accused of running a years-long scheme that siphoned more than $100,000 from tenants at the Lucaya apartment community, many of whom did not speak English as a first language. Jessyka May Hernandez Ortega was arrested after an audit of tenant leases uncovered a pattern of missing rent payments, falsified records, and forged money orders stretching back to late 2022.
The arrest follows an investigation by the Delray Beach Police Department into missing rent funds at Lucaya, located on Ilene Court, according to CBS12. The community itself is sizable — records show the property was historically developed as Delray Estates Condominium in four phases between 1974 and 1983, and today comprises 324 residential units spread across 81 two-story fourplex buildings near South Congress Avenue and Linton Boulevard, according to Southern Valuation Services.
An Audit Unravels the Scheme
The alleged fraud came to light when Maya Prashkovsky LLC began an audit of tenant leases in May 2025, comparing physical paperwork against entries in the Yardi leasing software the community used to track payments. Hernandez Ortega resigned when that audit began, the station's report notes. Residents subsequently came forward with receipts and money order stubs proving they had, in fact, paid their rent in full.
Investigators allege Hernandez Ortega deposited tenant rent and move-in deposit money orders into her own personal accounts at Wells Fargo, Bank of America, and Chase, then altered numbers within the Yardi system to cover her tracks. She allegedly shifted funds from paying tenants over to delinquent accounts, effectively rotating stolen money between ledgers — a maneuver commonly known as a lapping scheme — to keep the books from raising alarms. Some tenants were allegedly forced to move units, and false eviction paperwork was allegedly filed against others, per the same account.
Targeting Non-English Speakers
Because Hernandez Ortega also collected funds on behalf of independent unit owners within the complex, she is accused of using money stolen from one group of tenants to pay owners who had previously been shorted, masking the shortfall. Investigators allege she specifically relied on the fact that many residents were immigrants who spoke English as a second language, accepting blank money orders from non-English-speaking tenants and then writing her own name and address in as the payee.
That vulnerability is not incidental to the neighborhood. Delray Beach is a city where 23.5% of residents are foreign-born and 28.1% of residents aged 5 and older speak a language other than English at home, according to U.S. Census Bureau data — a demographic reality that can leave non-English-speaking renters especially exposed to this kind of exploitation. The city has an estimated population of over 70,000, with a median household income of $82,041 and a poverty rate of roughly 13%, per Data USA.
Insurance Money and a Fire Left Uninsured
Beyond the rent itself, Hernandez Ortega is accused of pocketing cash that residents paid for renter's and vehicle insurance that was never actually purchased. One resident was reportedly left completely uninsured when her apartment caught fire, according to the CBS12 report. Investigators also allege she charged residents $20 cash to notarize paperwork for free community events — double the $10-per-signature cap that Florida Statute 117.05 sets for standard in-person notarial acts, according to OpenExamPrep.
Separately, investigators allege Hernandez Ortega used a Home Depot credit card opened under a fake name to order personal cleaning supplies to her own home address. Whether she held an active Community Association Manager license through the state remains an open question raised by the case; Florida's Department of Business and Professional Regulation requires that license for anyone managing residential associations with more than 10 units or annual budgets exceeding $100,000, according to the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation.
The Numbers Behind the Charges
Between December 2022 and May 2025, investigators say 764 separate money orders totaling $284,020 were deposited into Hernandez Ortega's personal accounts. Detectives were ultimately able to trace $102,827 of that total directly to stolen tenant rent payments, the station's report states.
Prosecutors are permitted under Florida law to aggregate numerous smaller thefts or money order deposits into a single criminal count when they can demonstrate a continuous, systematic course of conduct, according to George Law — the same legal mechanism that has been used to bring first-degree felony charges in similar embezzlement cases. Hernandez Ortega was booked into the Palm Beach County Jail on charges of organized scheme to defraud over $50,000 and grand theft of over $100,000.
Under Florida Statute 817.034(4)(a)1, an organized scheme to defraud involving property valued at $50,000 or more is a first-degree felony carrying up to 30 years in state prison and a $10,000 fine, according to Online Sunshine. Grand theft of property valued at $100,000 or more likewise carries up to 30 years under Florida Statute 812.014(2)(a). Police say additional charges against Hernandez Ortega may still be coming.
Not an Isolated Case in Florida
The allegations echo a similar case from earlier this year. In April, a Martin County property manager nearly pulled off a comparable embezzlement scheme before being booked on 124 felony charges, per the same CBS12 account. Meanwhile, current two-bedroom rental listings at Lucaya on Ilene Court show monthly rates between $2,025 and $2,050, according to Fulton Grace Realty — a reminder of just how much of tenants' monthly budgets were potentially at stake in the alleged scheme.
