Print Version

TALLAHASSEE, FL - Attorney General Bill McCollum today announced that a Brevard County woman has been arrested for defrauding the Florida Medicaid program out of more than $4,000. Tavia Denise Hines was arrested today by law enforcement officers with the Attorney General’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit with assistance from the Brevard County Sheriff’s Office.

Investigators with the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit discovered the fraud after being contacted by Hidden Potentials, Inc., a home and community-based service provider in Titusville that employed Hines, 35, as an independent contractor. The investigation revealed that Hines, of Port St. John, submitted falsified service logs for services never performed. As a result, Hidden Potentials paid Hines $4,065 in reimbursements from the Florida Medicaid program.

Hines is charged with one count of Medicaid fraud and one count of grand theft, both third-degree felonies. If convicted, she faces up to 10 years in prison and a $10,000 fine. The case is being prosecuted by the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit through the State Attorney’s Office for the 18th Judicial Circuit.