Page 90 of Don't Say a Word

“Nope. There are cases like this all over the country. Recently in California, a husband and wife applied for housing benefits using stolen identities and pocketed more than half a million dollars. In Louisiana, a guy ran a similar scam as my mother-daughterteam, buying instead of stealing a Medicaid list and charging for services never provided. There are doctors who pad all services for every Medicaid patient, or charge for tests and procedures never done.”

Jessie leaned back. “Does that help?”

I nodded. “I knew fraud was out there, but other than a couple civil insurance scams, I haven’t worked fraud cases. Last year a private insurer hired me to determine if a loss was legit. Someone claimed a bunch of jewelry was stolen from their house, insured for over two million bucks. But the insurance company was skeptical, hired me to investigate. The wife really thought it had been stolen, but the husband actually sold the jewels to pay off gambling debts he didn’t want his wife to find out about, then filed the fraudulent report.”

“And he probably didn’t even go to prison,” Jessie said.

“Nope. But he didn’t get the insurance money, and his wife divorced and sued him. I testified for her, she ended up with a nice settlement. In the end, justice was mostly served.”

I sipped my Guinness, considered my approach, decided on straightforward. Jessie was knowledgeable and had so far been open.

“Have you investigated EBT fraud?”

“Sure. Lots of scams out there, both to game the system and to steal benefits from those who are eligible.”

“What are the most common?”

“Fraudulently applying for benefits, usually under a false identity. Nearly a third of all SNAP fraud is because of false identities. I nailed one guy who ran a scam filing for dead people—literally they die, he applies for benefits, and the system is so behind no one knows the person is dead. He gets the EBT cards, sells them for cash. A lot of people fraudulently apply when they aren’t eligible, and many apply under multiple names and socials. There’s also skimmers out there who pull the money off EBT cards like people do with credit card readers. That’s about twenty percent of the fraud, and it pisses me off because these people are literallystealing from people who can’t afford to lose those benefits. They get the benefits back, but that costs the system. It’s a mess. I do what I can.” Jessie sipped her Harp and munched on the complimentary peanuts.

“What about using an EBT card to pay for ineligible goods?”

“Like alcohol and cigarettes? Happens all the time. The store has to be in on it—they have a UPC code for an eligible item like canned food and ring that up, but sell them a pint of vodka. It’s more common for someone to sell their card for cash, use the cash to buy, but I’ve fined a couple stores. Usually it’s just one employee, but management needs to be more diligent.”

“What about drugs?” I said. It had been running around in my head why Elijah was taking pictures of people coming out of the Cactus Stop without bags. A few people, sure. Cigarettes get stuffed in pockets. Lottery tickets in wallets. But the numbers seemed high.

“Our DEB unit has caught scammers buying up EBT cards from the homeless, who use the money for drugs and alcohol, then file for a new card saying it was lost, and the process starts all over again.”

“What about a store who, like ringing up food for an alcohol purchase, rings up food for an illegal drug purchase?”

Jessie stared at me, all serious, and said, “What do you know?”

“I don’t know anything. Just throwing ideas out.”

“Very specific ideas,” she said pointedly. I kept my poker face. I had no problem sharing my theory with her, but I also didn’t want the police to jump in before I had answers about Elijah’s death.

“Did you see something that made you suspicious?” Jessie asked.

“Yes,” I said. “And, if over the course of my investigation I can find hard proof, I’ll turn it over to you. But for now, it’s just a gut feeling, so I don’t want to blow my own case.”

“Which is?”

Carefully, I said, “A teenager died of a drug overdose. I’m tracking his last days, and I think he may have seen something illegal where he worked, which may have led to his death. It’s justa theory based on limited information, but I need to prove or disprove before I can move on.”

“Well,” Jessie said after a moment, “I’ll say this. I have heard of instances where a business was involved in fraudulent EBT use. I have even heard isolated cases where an employee was dealing drugs out of a business. A few years back at one of the major grocery stores, a cashier ran the scam, but her manager caught on pretty quick. We put her under surveillance, built a case, arrested her. I haven’t seen this sort of operation on a large scale.”

“Have you or your team ever investigated the Cactus Stop?”

Her eyes widened. “Not even close. In fact, the owner contacts law enforcement on a regular basis about crime in and around his businesses.”

“Ramos,” I said.

“Yes, Manny Ramos. He opened the first Cactus Stop more than twenty-five years ago, built one store into more than a dozen. If you know of any of his employees who may be involved in a crime, you need to let me know. He’ll help us take bad staff down. He’s done it before.”

“All right,” I said, having no intention of sharing the information yet, “if I uncover anything specific, I’ll let you know. I don’t want to bring down the hammer on anyone who’s innocent.”

“Ramos doesn’t want drugs on his property any more than we do.”

“How would a scam like that work?” I asked. “I understand ringing up food and giving them drugs or alcohol, but wouldn’t there be an inventory discrepancy?”