Costs of Corruption
When we talk about the cost of corruption, we tend to focus on the hard numbers: the billions of dollars the administration is wasting on cruel causes and redirecting to Trump and his family, friends, and allies.
But there’s also a clear human cost to the kleptocracy Trump is building. In this series, we document it all.
The Cost of Medicare Fraud: The Case of Adrian Galette
Adrian Galette is one of 14,000 senior citizens who suffered neglect as part of the largest Medicare fraud in history. At the heart of the scheme is Philip Esformes, the former owner of over 30 Miami-area skilled nursing and assisted living facilities. He and his co-conspirators stole $1.3 billion in taxpayer dollars over almost two decades before finally being caught and convicted for their crimes.
At least, until Trump pardoned Esformes and denied his victims and their families the restitution they deserve.
Empty Promises: The Fraudsters Who Stole Millions from the Oglala Sioux Tribe
On the Pine Ridge Reservation in southwestern South Dakota, economic development is a matter of survival.
The reservation has the lowest per capita income of any county in the country ($8,768), with unemployment hovering around 80 percent and more than half of the residents living below the poverty line. So when investors approached the Wakpamni Lake Community Corporation (WLCC), the economic development arm of the Oglala Sioux tribe, tribal leaders listened. The reservation is home to about 20,000 tribe members, all of whom would benefit from job opportunities from new projects and better community spaces.
Instead, the fraudulent investors swindled the tribe out of millions of dollars.