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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Thursday, July 17, 2003

Jail time ordered for Felix fraud

By David Waite
Advertiser Courts Writer

The first of three people indicted by the O'ahu grand jury on charges of submitting fraudulent bills claiming they supplied services to special-needs students in the public schools was sentenced to six months in jail yesterday.

Circuit Judge Richard Perkins also ordered Susan Puapuaga to repay her former employer, Alaka'i Na Keiki, $1,996 that the company paid her for work that was not performed.

Puapuaga pleaded no-contest in July 2002 to submitting claims for work she did not provide while working as a therapeutic aide.

Deputy Attorney General Michael Parrish told Perkins that Alaka'i Na Keiki had previously reimbursed the state for bills it submitted based on claims made by Puapuaga that she was providing services to special-education students, those covered by the so-called Felix consent decree.

Hawai'i's school system has been under the federal court's oversight since the state signed the decree in 1994. A special state House-Senate investigative committee was organized in early 2001 amid growing concerns about how the consent decree money was being spent.

Puapuaga tearfully apologized in court for her actions.

"I'm sorry about the choices I made," she said. "It's not only affecting me but my family as well. Whenever the sentence begins, please don't take me away from my kids."

But Perkins noted that Puapuaga already got a break when the court deferred accepting her guilty plea in 1999 for embezzling more than $8,000 from a Kmart store the year before.

State Sen. Colleen Hanabusa, co-chair of a joint state Senate-House Committee investigating Felix consent decree abuses, hailed the sentence as a clear message to others who might be tempted to engage in false billings related to any state program.

Sentencing is pending for former therapeutic aide Warren Johnson Jr., while a third former aide, Daniel Riedel, was indicted on multiple theft and fraud charges in May but has not yet been arraigned.