Many criminals deserve every ounce of punishment they receive. Others deserve the punishment, but also a round of applause for pulling off a brilliant well well-executed scheme. Shannon Nicole Womack of Pennsylvania is one such criminal.
Womack appeared to be another overworked healthcare professional fighting the good fight in the post-COVID hellscape of underfunded nursing homes. In reality, she was (allegedly) posing as four different nurses as a part of a sprawling case of fraud and alternate identities.
Womack, 39, was finally arrested in Pennsylvania after a routine traffic stop on I-79 turned into a surreal unraveling of her several identities. When state police pulled her over in April, she handed them a fake ID. That one lie cracked open a Pandora’s box of fraud so convoluted that they might as well have caught an international superspy red-handed.
Woman Almost Pulls Off Wild Identity Theft Scheme
According to police, Womack had been impersonating at least four legitimate nurses from southern states, bouncing between staffing agencies and nursing homes throughout Pennsylvania since 2020. The fraud is likely to extend to states beyond Pennsylvania, but the authorities aren’t yet sure of that. She allegedly used 20 different aliases and seven Social Security numbers.
The lengths Womack went to disguise her web of schemes are mightily impressive. She allegedly created a fake LLC to act as her own staffing agency, placing herself in gigs as a licensed practical nurse, registered nurse, and even as a supervising RN. She built an entire ecosystem of fake credentials and forged documents to “self-deploy,” as the police put it in a statement, across the Pennsylvania medical landscape.
Police say her scam thrived during the COVID-19 pandemic, when healthcare centers were desperate and staffing pipelines were in disarray. She took full advantage. Investigators found IDs, prescriptions, forged medical documents, and equipment in her vehicle.
She now faces 43 charges, including identity theft, forgery, and endangering care-dependent patients, plus drug paraphernalia possession. Her bail is set at $250,000. Her next court date is set for July 29, assuming she doesn’t create another elaborate web of identities and walk out under the guise of a security guard from Gettysburg named Chuck.
The post Woman Faked Being 4 Different Nurses at Once in Complex Identity Theft Scheme appeared first on VICE.
