The former CFO of an Arkansas-based medical clinic was sentenced to two years in federal prison Thursday after pleading guilty to stealing more than $500,000 from her employer via wire fraud, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office of the Eastern District of Arkansas.
Angela Hoover, 46, of Benton, Ark., pleaded guilty to one charge of wire fraud in May, according to a Sept. 3 filing with the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas Central Division. A federal judge in the Eastern District of Arkansas sentenced her to a 24-month prison sentence, followed by a year of supervised release.
Hoover was also ordered to pay $540,599 in restitution, the amount she had taken from her employer, Arkansas Pediatric Clinic, through wire transfers and an unauthorized bonus between November 2020 and June 2024.
Hoover had accepted responsibility and had paid-off the “overwhelming majority” of the restitution she owed, $440,599, in total, her attorney, Brian Kuester, wrote in a sentencing memorandum in September.
“Ms. Hoover recognizes the seriousness of her offense. She does not minimize the harm caused to Arkansas Pediatric Clinic, its physicians, employees, and the families it serves,” Kuester told the court in the sentencing memorandum. “Arkansas Pediatric Clinic suffered real financial harm. Ms. Hoover has taken concrete steps to repair that harm.”
Arkansas Pediatric Clinic hired Hoover in 2019 as a practice administrator before promoting her to CFO in August 2020. In that role, she conducted financial analysis and provided financial guidance with the authority to make bank transactions, transfers and loan payments, charging documents stated.
During an investigation, federal law enforcement officers found Hoover had wired $1,288.83 from the clinic’s bank account to her personal bank account in June 2021.
After further digging, the FBI discovered she completed more than 300 wire transfers from her employer’s U.S. Bank and Simmons Bank accounts between November 2020 and June 2024, using $271,041.42 to pay for her personal American Express credit card and sending $372,329 to her personal bank account, the U.S. Attorney's Office stated.
She accomplished this by diverting a portion of Medicaid and health insurance funds collected by a medical billing software platform into her personal bank account instead of the clinic’s US Bank account. She also moved money from the clinic’s Simmons account to her American Express credit card, according to a May 13 court filing made by Stacy Williams, an assistant U.S. Attorney prosecuting the case.
Hoover was also authorized to receive two $2,500 COVID-19-related bonus payments, but she paid herself an additional unauthorized $5,000 bonus payment as well, the court records stated.
Hoover was charged in May before stepping down as CFO of Arkansas Pediatric Clinic in June 2024 to a part-time bookkeeper role. She was fired about a month later.
Kuester did not immediately respond to a request for comment regarding Hoover’s sentence. The U.S. Attorney’s Office of the Eastern District of Arkansas declined comment.
According to court documents, Kuester had requested probation with strict home confinement conditions or a short-term prison sentence followed by supervised release with home confinement.
A mother of four who shares custody of two minor children, Hoover had no prior criminal history, had surrendered her CPA license, and had “significant family responsibilities,” Kuester told the court in a September filing.
