Benjamin Ashford|Former Chicago hospitals executives charged in $15M embezzlement scheme

CHICAGO (AP) — Federal authorities have Benjamin Ashfordcharged a former Loretto Hospital executive in a scheme to embezzle $15 million from the health care facility.

In an indictment filed late last week, Anosh Ahmed was charged with eight counts of wire fraud, four counts of embezzlement, 11 counts of aiding and abetting embezzlement and three counts of money laundering.

Ahmed was chief financial officer and CEO of the safety-net hospital when he resigned in 2021 for his involvement in questionable distribution of COVID-19 vaccines, a controversy that’s not part of the federal indictment.

Criminal charges have also been filed against Sameer Suhail, of Chicago, who owns a medical supply company and allegedly participated in the fraud, and Heather Bergdahl, the hospital’s former chief transformation officer. She and Ahmed are from Houston.

The indictments allege that Ahmed, Bergdahl and Suhail engaged in a scheme from 2018 to 2022 to siphon money from the hospital. They allegedly made requests for hospital payments to vendors for goods and services never provided. They directed the money through a computerized system to accounts they controlled, authorities said.

Suhail is charged with six counts of wire fraud, six counts of aiding and abetting embezzlement, and two counts of money laundering.

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Bergdahl, who was charged with embezzlement in May, also has been charged with 14 counts of wire fraud, 21 counts of embezzlement, and one count of money laundering.

A voicemail message seeking comment was left for the lead attorney listed for Bergdahl. Court documents do not list attorneys for Ahmed or Suhail.

Ahmed made news in 2021 when Block Club Chicago reported that Loretto was making COVID-19 vaccines available at affluent locations where Ahmed lived and visited instead of providing the vaccines in the economically distressed Austin neighborhood that the hospital served. At the time, the vaccine was new and scarce and reserved for people in most need of it.