Public administrator pleads guilty to Medicaid abuse

AP / June 18, 2015


JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — An eastern Missouri elected official has pleaded guilty to Medicaid abuse and ordered to surrender her office immediately.

Missouri Attorney General Chris Koster says 63-year-old Katherine O’Neail of Mineral Point was sentenced Thursday to three years in prison, but that was suspended pending completion of five years of supervised probation and payment of restitution.

Koster says O’Neail was elected as Washington County’s public administrator in 2012. Before that she was business office manager at a nursing home in Potosi, where she stole more than $13,000 from the resident trust fund for her personal use.

She pleaded guilty Thursday to one felony count of abuse of a person receiving health care.