Lori Butts, the former operator of Milwaukee-area adult family homes, was sentenced on Oct. 22 to 28 months in federal prison for a Medicaid fraud scheme. The court also ordered her to pay $1,253,920.47 in restitution to Medicaid, WFRV Local 5 reported; BizTimes Milwaukee identified U.S. District Court Judge J.P. Stadtmueller as issuing the order.
The case concerned Lordan Care Adult Family Home LLC, which had a contract with Community Care Inc. to staff and provide services for eligible residents. Reporting by BizTimes Milwaukee says the scheme ran from July 2019 through December 2020. Prosecutors said Butts billed for staffing required by the contract while providing fewer caregivers than promised, including workers billed for a round-the-clock assignment who were not present. The article described the amount collected as approximately $1.4 million; the court-ordered restitution was a separate, specific figure.
Facility oversight and payment claims are distinct
Wisconsin’s adult family homes are part of the state’s assisted-living system. The Wisconsin Department of Health Services says its Division of Quality Assurance licenses and regulates adult family homes. The agency also says its surveys review areas including resident rights, services, safety, medication and staff training. Those facility reviews provide regulatory context, but the agency’s description does not establish how the specific Medicaid bills in Butts’s case were verified.
A separate federal filing offers another Wisconsin example, with important limits. In an information filed in the Eastern District of Wisconsin, the U.S. Department of Justice alleged that Jasmine Cooper engaged in a Wisconsin Medicaid fraud scheme from at least July 2020 through December 2022. That filing concerns a different defendant and is an allegation, not a conviction or part of Butts’s case. The overlap in dates and Medicaid funding does not show a connection between the cases or establish how common such schemes are.
