A Suffolk woman pleaded guilty in federal court this week to illegally obtaining more than $1.3 million through a health-care fraud scheme.
Whitteney Guyton, owner of Synergy Health Systems LLC, billed Medicaid and the Virginia Department of Medical Assistance Services with falsified patient documents for more than two years, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office.
Synergy Health Systems offered respite care and mental health services, which required assessments by licensed professionals to comply with Medicaid regulations. The business included counseling, therapeutic treatment centers, an adult day care center and a pharmacy.
According to prosecutors, Guyton had a social worker on staff from 2016 to July 2017, but that person resigned July 12, 2017. After that, Guyton instructed other staff members to forge the social worker’s signature on assessments. According to authorities, Medicaid received the forged assessments and authorized more than $350,000 from the false documents. The Department of Medical Assistance Services also received documents with forged signatures of a registered nurse.
“In addition to the forgeries, there was missing (and) incomplete documentation regarding comprehensive needs assessments, recipient files, community-based care assessments and plans of care,” federal court documents on the case stated. “An additional $966,665 is attributed to these incomplete claims.”
More than 35 patients had documentation that was forged or falsified. For some, there was no documentation that any assessment had ever been done while they were in the hospital, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office.
Guyton has also been involved in numerous business operations in Hampton Roads. She founded We Buy The Block, a real estate investment firm that invested $1.8 million in Gloucester County.Guyton was also the principal owner of the investment group, 5 Elite Group, co-owner of the area’s first Black-owned brewery, 1865 Brewing in Hampton, and Shew Velocity Sportsplex in Portsmouth.
In 2021, 5 Elite Group announced plans to spend $15 million in Portsmouth to redevelop the former Tidewater Community College visual arts building and an adjacent Dollar General into luxury apartments, a restaurant and a duckpin bowling alley.
In 2022, Guyton was named one of Inside Business’s Women in Business. The brewery closed in October after it was “unable to be financially sustainable,” according to a Facebook post from the business. The address for the Shew Velocity Sportsplex in Portsmouth, 900 Broad Street, is available for lease, and Guyton’s plans for the former TCC and Dollar General site did not come to fruition.
She pleaded guilty to one count of healthcare fraud and six counts of making false statements relating to health-care matters, and will be sentenced in January. Guyton faces up to 10 years in prison.
Eliza Noe, eliza.noe@virginiamedia.com
