Woman gets 3 years for Medicaid fraud

A woman has been sentenced to three years in prison for Medicaid fraud.

Delphine Lucas, 50, pleaded guilty to one felony count of vendor fraud on July 7, according to a statement from Illinois State Police. She has since been sentenced to 36 months in the Illinois Department of Corrections.

The state police Medicaid Fraud Control Bureau received a tip about possible Medicaid fraud in April of 2015, police said. The subsequent investigation revealed that Lucas, a former personal assistant from Chicago, defrauded Medicaid of $3,710.

She had been submitting documents for payments for medical care for a patient who was actually incarcerated at the time, police said.

Her prison sentence will be followed by one year of mandatory supervised release, according to police.