Former public defender faces sentencing for healthcare fraud
A former public defender from Iowa who had previously been arrested for shoplifting will be sentenced in September for defrauding Medicaid and cancer patients. (Image from Shutterstock)
A former public defender from Iowa who had previously been arrested for shoplifting will be sentenced in September for defrauding Medicaid and cancer patients.
Attorney Cassi Wigington could face up to 10 years in prison and has agreed to forfeit $445,455 in proceeds for her part in a scheme to overbill Medicaid for products that cancer patients never received.
Wigington was first licensed to practice law in Iowa in January 2020. Last year, she admitted in court filings that in August and September 2023, she shoplifted repeatedly from a Hy-Vee store in Gretna, Nebraska, stealing more than 300 items worth $2,721, according to a story by the Iowa Capital Dispatch.
Wigington entered into a diversion agreement in which she agreed to pay restitution, and the theft charge was dismissed. The Iowa Supreme Court decided in June 2025 to suspend her license for six months and reinstated her in December 2025 after several local judges and a member of the Iowa legislature wrote letters on her behalf.
Six months after her license was reinstated, a federal grand jury in Nebraska charged Wigington with one count of healthcare fraud. That same day, Wigington entered a guilty plea, according to the Iowa Capital Dispatch.
Her sentencing is slated for Sept. 10 in federal court in Nebraska.
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