Can my sister be commiting Medicaid fraud?

I'm not sure if this is Medicaid fraud or not. Was the money from the assets applied to your mother's care? Did your sister have POA or permission from your mother? Was there a house that had any equity? We need to know a lot more to answer this question. What is your mother's health problem and why might your sister want her living close to her? There are two possibilities I see: 1) Your sister is really mean and potentially abused her POA, or 2) this is what needed to be done. Since your mother is in Medicaid housing, I suspect there were not many resources and not much money even after things were sold. Tell us a bit more about the situation and someone may have some better advice on what to do.

What in the world is Medicaid housing? I've never heard anything named that before? Doesn't sound like fraud to me.

No such thing as Medicaid housing. Get the facts before you accuse.

Who is telling you that mom lives in " Medicaid housing" do you mean a nursing home? Low cost senior housing? Is your sister POA? Does your mom have dementia.?

I’m sorry for the lack of facts I guess I did not use the correct terminology, I’m posting this on my mothers behalf trying to help her understand or get more information about a matter that in effecting our family. From this point forward ill write it from my point of view.
My grandmother fell and broke her shoulder about 6 weeks ago. She was to enter rehab after being released from the hospital. She was living in a continuing care retirement community in the independent living area, she was very active in the community and participated in daily programs that were offered and volunteered at the nursing home in the community.
When she fell my aunt took it into her own hands to drive the 4 hour trip to visit her and decided that she wouldn’t recover or that she wouldn’t be able to live on her own anymore. Without my grandmothers consent, while she was medicated she decided to clear out her apartment, sell her car, and give away items. This included a bring flat screen tv, sofa and love seat, and her crafts she was working on for the bazaar. She also sold some of my departed grandfathers belonging without any one in the family knowing.
My grandmother returned to her apartment that she has until the end of the month to discover the entire apartment was cleared out, her items were missing and some items were already boxed up and sent to a new place for her to live.
My aunt who does not have POA says she doesn’t want to make the drive to help her mom out and this is the only resolution. She has called my mother several times telling her that there mom is broke and she sold everything to help cover the cost of her driving back and fourth and moving her things to where she lives.
I live over 14 hours away and my mom lives over 20 hours away.
I know my grandmother had savings and she also did have many assets, but now she has little to nothing in her name and she says she doesn’t know how it happened because the last month was such a daze being medicated.
I only am concerned because my 82 years old grandmother texted me and then called and talked for over an hour today about it. She said just because she broke her “arm” doesn’t mean she died but that’s how my aunt is treating her. She said at her age you kind of have to go with the flow, but to me this does not seem right… any advice I could give to my mom or grandmother would greatly help

If your aunt didn't have POA for finances, she had no right to do this. Now that it is done, it is a bit of a mess. I'm sure your grandmother doesn't want to file criminal charges. What I would do in your situation is to go for a visit and evaluate things for myself. Knowing the things I do now about elders I've learned that there are often two sides to a story. If you or your mother spend a few days with them it will tell you a lot. Have you spent much time with your grandmother recently?

Another thing that may have happened is that your grandmother may have been out of it while she was in the hospital and rehab. Many old people become very confused in a hospital, particularly if they are drugged. I wonder if your aunt might have thought your grandmother would continue to be that confused, so acted on it.

What kind of facility is your grandmother living in now?

She is in her old apartment until my aunt comes and get her on Friday and takes her to her new apartment... When I questioned her she said would not give me details about the living situation but said she knew that it wasn't right that she had to move but she doesn't have a choice now. When I talk to her tomorrow I'll try to get the name of the place to look into. I know she said my aunt took her savings because she had money set aside in another account for my wedding and it is gone..... I told her that it doesn't matter I just want her to be happy and she just keeps telling me that "this can't be right" I guess it's jut hard when you care so much about some own but can't do anything. Thanks for ur feedback... I'll try to schedule a trip up to see her soon but now that she is totally reliant on my aunt I know it will be difficult

Mamitch, there may be things that happened in the hospital that your grandmother doesn't remember. That happens sometimes in hospitals. I don't know what happened, but I know you have to keep an open mind to both sides when it comes to elder care. Chances are that there was just a misunderstanding. I hope it is the case and that your aunt was not being malicious. Who knows? Maybe the new place will be even better than the old. I hope so. But I do sympathize with you. Your aunt should have let you and your mother know what was going on with something this major. And unless she has POA, she has no right to touch your grandmother's money or to sign a lease at a new place for her. It is hard to know what to think. I know how you feel in this situation, since there was no communication.

Mamitch, who DOES have PoA? That person should be alerted to what is going on.

Where does Medicaid come into this?

I can certainly understand your Aunt wanting to have your Grandmother someplace close as she becomes more frail. It becomes a real burden on family members to coordinate hospital care from afar. My mom used to live in IL close to her old home. When she had a stroke and it was determined that she needed NH care, we decided to move her very close to where one brother lives. It really is necessary at some point to do this, or to pay for a geriatric care manager.

Have you tried talking to your Aunt about what's going on? Has your grandmother been diagnosed with, say, mild cognitive impairment or early dementia?

PS, your Aunt can't just" put "your Grandma on Medicaid. If Aunt misappropriated Grandma's assets, Medicaid will know about it. I strongly suspect that your Aunt has a very different version of this story. In the interest of peace in your family, give your Aunt the benefit of the doubt and hear her out.

Consider the fact that Grandma's IL apartment was costing money. Is it possible that's where the money she had was spent? Was she handling her own finances before her fall?

To me, the key thing is that neither you nor your mother seem to have a clear picture of what your grandmother's real financial situation is. And, quite possibly, until this life-altering fall happened, your aunt hadn't either.

It is possible - isn't it? - that your aunt was doing the best she could in difficult circumstances. Let's suppose that your grandmother had been living happily in her retirement community, liked it there, didn't want to think about having to move from it and therefore paid scant attention to how she was going to continue to fund it. She then had this nasty fall, your aunt arrives on the scene - to be fair, nobody else volunteered did they? - and finds herself with a right can of worms on her hands.

Obviously, I'm just hypothesising. But this does seem to be a case of "if you think you can do better, go to it." And certainly don't assume the worst about someone unless you have good reason to do so.

Is your aunt really the sort of person who would steal money that your grandmother had set aside for your wedding? Would you accuse her of that to her face? Because that is kind of what you're implying, and as allegations go it's a biggee.

I think you need to call your Aunt today and have a grownup to grownup conversation about Grandma. You really want to hear this story from Aunt's point of view. Please don't accuse her ofc anything until you hear this from her side. Is it possible that the doctors in the hospital advised that Grandma was no longer able to live without assistance? Is the place she's going a rehab place? Possibly paid for by Medicare, not Medicaid? There are SO many possibilities that explain this situation in a light that aunt did exactly the right thing. Please give her the benefit of the doubt.