Former Hartford Schools Executive Director of Financial Management Joanna Laiscell ,left, and Hartford Superintendent of Schools Leslie Torres-Rodriguez, right.
The Hartford Schools Executive Director of Financial Management, Joanna Laiscell was suspended for "unspecified" reasons on March 21, 2018. Now, according to a termination letter obtained through an FOI request by "We the People", Laiscell has been terminated amid allegations of financial and insurance fraud.
The allegations of fraud are detailed in the letter below from Hartford Superintendent of Schools Leslie Torres-Rodriguez sent to Laiscell on July 12th informing Laiscell of her termination.
The letter also claims that Laiscell altered an e-mail regarding an audit of the Board's Health care plan that detailed that "an estimated 320 dependents may be removed from the plan as a result of the audit". According to the Superintendent's letter, Laiscell removed that sentence before forwarding the e-mail on to the Superintendent.
It is unclear why Laiscell would have removed that sentence from the e-mail. It is also unclear if those "320 dependents" were on the insurance plan as a result of poor record keeping and lack of over sight or as a result of fraud. Either way, it is a substantial amount of money to potentially cover 320 people for Health Insurance they were not entitled to.
Laiscell did not return calls for comment.
It is also unclear at this time if this matter is being investigated by the Hartford Police for any criminal prosecution It also unclear what efforts the Hartford Schools intend to make to recover the dollar amount of the alleged fraud.
fraud.
Termination Letter - Joanna Laiscell HPS 7-12-2018 by
Kevin Brookman on Scribd
