VA fraud: 2 charged in scheme stealing from sick veterans

Two people were indicted for fraud after they created and maintained a scheme that targeted seriously ill veterans.

Darryl Lamont Young, 46, is a former Washington State Department of Corrections inmate and was already in custody at King County Jail for unrelated charges. His accomplice, Aqeelah Ngiesha Williams, 27, was arrested Friday morning and subsequently pleaded “not guilty” in federal court.

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“The conduct in this case is truly shocking – calling medical facilities and seriously ill veterans under the pretense of being a VA employee trying to provide the ill veteran with financial benefits,” U.S. Attorney Tessa Gorman said. “In reality, these two were seeking personal and financial information to defraud the veteran. While they did not get a huge amount of money with this scheme, the harm they caused to those already suffering a health crisis is deserving of federal prosecution.”

Young previously served in the military. According to the indictment, Young learned which services were provided to veterans and how. Between December 2021 and April 2023, while incarcerated, Young used the jail phone system to place calls to veteran’s facilities, asking to be transferred to a particular medical facility as a way to hide where the call was coming from. Once connected to the medical facility, Young allegedly posed as a Veteran’s Affairs (VA) employee who needed information, like phone numbers and emergency contacts, about the various patients currently in the Intensive Care Unit.

“Once Young had information about a seriously ill veteran, he would call Williams who allegedly placed a three-way call to the veteran or the relative listed as the veteran’s representative,” Gorman stated. “Young would pretend to be a VA employee calling with information about benefits to be deposited to the veteran’s bank account.”

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Once Young and Williams had the information they needed, they would steal money from the victims’ accounts and transfer them to accounts they controlled. Both Young and Williams targeted more than 60 victims across 30 different VA and non-VA medical facilities. According to the indictment, the pair attempted approximately 130 fraudulent transactions on victim accounts, obtaining roughly $8,000 from the scheme.

The pair are charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, six counts of wire fraud for phone calls made via wire to various VA medical centers across the country and six counts of aggravated identity theft for their possession or use of personal information from the victims for fraud.

Frank Sumrall is a content editor at MyNorthwest. You can read his stories here and you can email him here