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Breaking News…EZ boss accused of stealing $5.4M from hospital chain

…Sonny Ramdeo transferred money to EZ Jet—court records

WEST PALM BEACH (Court House News Service) – A hospital chain claims in court that its payroll manager and his two companies embezzled $5.4 million from it.

Promise Healthcare and 11 of its hospitals have sued Sonny Ramdeo, PayServ Tax and Ez-Jet for a US$5.4M embezzlement.

Promise Healthcare and 11 of its hospitals sued Sonny Ramdeo, PayServ Tax and Ez-Jet GT, in Palm Beach County Court. It claims it hired Ramdeo eight years ago to manage payroll for its 3,500 employees in its hospitals nationwide.
Promise accuses, “Sonny Ramdeo, and his companies (of) stealing over five million dollars from Promise through a sophisticated scheme of fraud and deception. Specifically, Ramdeo incorporated a company called ‘PayServ Tax Inc.’ and deceived Promise’s senior management into believing that PayServ was a legitimate payroll tax processing company affiliated with the nationally known payroll processing company, Ceridian.
“Based on this lie, he deceived Promise into transferring millions of dollars to PayServ Tax Inc. and diverted over five million dollars of Promise’s money to himself and his companies,” the complaint states.
Ceridian is not a party to the complaint.
”Around October 2010, Ramdeo incorporated PayServ,” the complaint states. “Thereafter, through a sophisticated fraud including false representations, fabricated documents and e-mails, and a fictitious website, Ramdeo deceived Promise’s senior management into believing that Promise’s payroll taxes were being received, processed, and paid by Ceridian (a global payroll services company that Promise had used for years).
Instead, Ramdeo received Promise’s money allocated for payroll taxes through his own company, PayServ, so that he could steal millions of dollars from Promise along the way. Upon information and belief, he did this by forging signatures on standing transfer orders that purported to authorize Promise’s bank to debit funds from Promise’s account for transfer to PayServ’s account at PNC Bank. …
”Significantly, in the past two months alone, Ramdeo stole $5,387,000 from Promise by diverting its funds to Ez Jet. He did this by diverting money in the PayServ account that had been deposited for payment of Promise’s payroll taxes to his jet charter company, EZJet GT Inc.
”Upon information and belief, since creating PayServ, Ramdeo has been knowingly and intentionally misstating the amount of payroll taxes actually due by Promise and/or misstating the amount of payroll taxes actually transferred to government agencies and stealing the excess funds (in a sum that exceeds $5,000,000).
“Ramdeo effected this fraud through a sophisticated scheme of fraud that deceived not only Promise’s senior management, but also its auditors. This is because Ramdeo not only fabricated documents, but also emails and websites to deceive Promise and its auditors into believing that Ceridian was receiving and processing Promise’s payroll taxes.
For example, when Promise’s senior management requested additional information from Ramdeo regarding the Ceridian bank account where payroll taxes were being deposited, Ramdeo provided Promise’s senior management with a document – on Ceridian letterhead – which purported to identify ‘the Payroll Trust Account information in which Promise Healthcare’s taxes are being collected into and disbursed out of.’ Ramdeo even fabricated an e-mail to himself from a purported Ken Taylor of Paytax so that it would appear as if he had received the Paytax letter from a third party.
However, like Ramdeo’s other representations, the PayTax Letter and the e-mail from a purported Ken Taylor were fraudulent. They were fabricated by Ramdeo in response to Promise’s request for additional information about the payroll tax account.
”The PayTax Letter and email were only one part of Ramdeo’s scheme. For example, upon information and belief, Ramdeo also purchased the domain name Pay-tax.com and directed that Internet address to link directly to Ceridian’s website so that anyone investigating Pay-tax.com would be deceived into thinking that they were dealing with Ceridian.” (Citations to exhibits omitted; parentheses in complaint.)
The hospitals seek damages for fraud, unjust enrichment, conversion, and civil theft and imposition of a constructive trust.
They are represented by Matthew Triggs, with Proskauer Rose, of Boca Raton.