A 51-year-old woman from Arizona who ran a therapy clinic for kids with special needs was found guilty of fraud for abusing federal loans during the pandemic and will go to jail.
Last week, a judge in Maricopa County Superior Court gave Bridget Corinne O’Brien a two-year prison term followed by three years of probation. This is because she took advantage of programs that were set up to help businesses stay open during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“O’Brien was also told to repay the federal Small Business Administration with $1.3 million,” says the office of Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes.
Roy Garrison, who is in charge of Mayes’ Medicaid Fraud Control Unit, found that O’Brien abused the government loan money by buying a $1.9 million home in Phoenix. Investigators found that O’Brien also used the money to go on trips, buy clothes and furniture, and pay for one of her children to take volleyball lessons.
A mother of two with a master’s degree in speech pathology, O’Brien opened Head to Toe Therapy, a therapy center in Phoenix for kids. In November 2019, the clinic was taken off of Arizona’s Medicaid program, according to records from state Medicaid and the court.
According to O’Brien’s presentence report, what he did was “thoughtful, intentional, and may have stopped money from being given to another business owner in need during a hard time.”
Court records show that O’Brien got $2.9 million in loans from the U.S. Small Business Administration in 2020 and 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic. State inspectors found that her loan applications had “gross material misrepresentations” that let her get loans fraudulently. She then used the loans to pay for a lavish lifestyle.
Additionally to Head to Toe Therapy, the presentence report states that O’Brien was the owner of “multiple limited liability companies, many of which received COVID-19 relief loans from the U.S. Small Business Administration.” At that time, the government agency had two programs: the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) and the Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL).
The presentence report says that O’Brien’s businesses asked for four PPP loans and 19 EIDL loans from March 31, 2020, to January 12, 2021.
Federal Trade Commission records show that Bridget O’Brien is the officer of the for-profit Phoenix-based company Head to Toe Therapy Inc., but the company is not currently running and did not file an annual report since 2021. According to state records, the business was officially set up for the first time in 2007.
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