BOYD WILLIAM LEAHY, age 45, and ANGELINA LEAHY, also age 45, were sentenced today to prison terms for charges stemming from a multi-count health care fraud indictment, announced U. S. Attorney Jim Letten. BOYD LEAHY was sentenced to 37 months imprisonment and ANGELINA LEAHY was sentenced to 24 months imprisonment.

According to the charges in an indictment filed in May 2012, the LEAHYS, a Covington-area couple, were employed at a sleep clinic in Covington, Louisiana, owned by their friends, two local physicians. The indictment charged that BOYD LEAHY as the office manager for the clinic and ANGELINA LEAHY, as the part-time billing clerk conspired to commit health care fraud by creating a rival business entity, Sleep Corp., that the LEAHYS used to fraudulently bill insurance companies for services which were actually rendered by their employing clinic. When the LEAHYS received insurance payments on behalf of their rival company Sleep Corp., they kept the proceeds rather than give it to their friends and employers, whose clinic actually rendered the services. ANGELINA LEAHY then doctored the payment records for their employing clinic to further conceal their fraud.

Additionally, as alleged in the indictment, BOYD LEAHY, as office manager of the clinic used his position to generate extra paychecks for himself and to pay himself more than he was authorized to earn and he did the same for his wife, ANGELINA LEAHY. BOYD LEAHY also added his daughter, his father, and a creditor to his employing clinic’s payroll without authorization, causing paychecks to be issued when none of these individuals had performed any work on the clinic’s behalf. BOYD LEAHY also used the employing clinic’s corporate credit card and business checking account to fund personal expenses, trips, and household utilities without the clinic owners’ knowledge or authorization. The total loss sustained by the clinic owners for this fraudulent scheme totaled $827,946.

Calling the case “one of the worst crimes in [his] 14 years on the bench,” and “one of the most mind-boggling cases [he’s] ever seen,” United States District Judge Carl Barbier chastised BOYD and ANGELINA LEAHY for their lack of remorse and stated that there was “no real remorse here, only remorse that they got caught.” As to BOYD LEAHY, Judge Barbier found that he had “the ability to charm many people,” and that it was “incomprehensible” that he had committed this “massive fraud against anyone, much less to longstanding friends.” After pronouncing sentence, the judge stated that this was a “tragic and sad case all around...and the [LEAHYS] helped to destroy two families...financially and emotionally,” referencing both the victim physicians’ and the defendants’ families.

The case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Office of Inspector General for the United States Department of Health and Human Services.

The case was prosecuted by Special Assistant United States Attorney Juliana Etland and Assistant United States Attorney Patrice Sullivan.

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