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Florida Sues Home Care Provider Targeting Elderly

January 11, 2006
Florida Attorney General Charlie has filed suit against a Florida corporation and its owner for selling allegedly fraudulent contracts for home health care services to senior citizens.

Clearwater-based Intrust Home Care and its president, Roy F. Fitzgerald, are accused of taking more than $146,000 from several dozen elderly residents despite never contracting or paying for any of the home care services they promised to provide.

The lawsuit, filed in Leon County Circuit Court, alleges that Intrust and Fitzgerald sold what were purported to be contracts for home care services, such as dressing, laundry, bathing and housekeeping.

Investigators determined that Fitzgerald promised the services but never contracted for anyone to actually provide those services, and failed to maintain reserves to pay for the services should they be needed.

Intrust routinely imposed a 6-to-12 month waiting period before the services would be provided, and in at least four instances the victims died before the waiting period had elapsed.

Senior victims in Florida, and others in California, Virginia and Illinois, paid for contracts at annual rates ranging from approximately $700 to more than $7,600.

Other services Intrust was supposed to provide included meals, toileting, grooming, excursions and mobility assistance. Contract holders were also told falsely that they could order home companions through Intrust.

"It is bad enough to make senior citizens wait for one year to receive services they paid for, but we now know they would have waited the rest of their lives to ever have their laundry done or houses cleaned," said Crist. "This is unconscionable behavior."

Although the contracts appeared similar to insurance and home health care contracts, they were not, at the time, regulated by any state agency.

Typical of those victimized by Fitzgerald and his company is Doris Williams. The 88-year-old Leesburg, Fla., resident contracted with Intrust for home health services, paying more than $3,000.

At some point after she purchased the contract, Williams fell and seriously injured her wrist. Believing she could use the services for which she had contracted, Williams tried contacting Intrust but received no response for a year. She finally contacted the Attorney General's Office and filed a complaint against the company.

The state is seeking a permanent injunction stopping Intrust from issuing any further insurance-like contracts, and is asking the court to require the company to pay refunds to the victims and pay penalties, costs and fees.

Fitzgerald faces possible penalties of up to $915,000 plus restitution.

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