LITTLE ROCK — A Maumelle woman who worked at a Little Rock doctor’s office is accused of using patient information to open credit-card accounts and ship merchandise to her old residence, according to Little Rock detectives.
Mesha White, 32, was arrested and booked at the Pulaski County jail on eight counts of financial identity fraud Wednesday morning. White was released later in the afternoon on a $2,500 bond.
The investigation began Nov. 29, when a 71-year-old woman received a letter from Capital Retail Bank telling her that her application for a J.C. Penney Co. credit card had been declined.
The woman, the affidavit said, did not apply for that card nor any of the others corresponding to notices she had been receiving in the mail.
When she spoke with bank officials, she discovered someone had used her personal information to try to get a card.
The application for the card was filed online on Nov. 25, affidavits said. Police tracked the Internet Protocol address for the computer used to apply for the card back to the offices of Dr. John Michael Carney, a dermatologist with an office in southwest Little Rock.
Carney told detectives that his patients’ personal information was kept in both paper files and billing information on the computer, which White had access to.
Carney handed over employee access codes to detectives, which show when an employee uses an entrance to the office.
On Nov. 25, a Sunday, when offices were closed, White’s was the only access number used, affidavits said.
Carney told detectives that White also had been seen with a personal computer connected to the office computer.
From November through early January, three other patients, including a 75-year-old man who suffered from Alzheimer’s, learned that their information had been used to open credit accounts with different businesses.
The affidavits said that merchandise was then shipped to a vacant apartment at 12100 Rainwood Road that had been leased to White in 2007, until she was evicted for failure to pay rent.
A witness at the complex told detectives that she saw a woman matching White’s description - and driving a blue BMW owned by White - come to the complex and pick up the packages outside White’s former apartment.
In 2007, White negotiated a guilty plea to a felony forgery charge and, in 2008, negotiated a guilty plea to theft of leased, rented or entrusted personal property. She was also found guilty of a felony count of forgery.
Carney was not in his office for comment Wednesday. Staff at his office declined to comment other than to say that White was no longer employed there.
Arkansas, Pages 10 on 02/14/2013