Regina Garcia has power of attorney over her father’s retirement fund. Now she needs an attorney after being charged with misspending almost $16,000 of that money.

Regina Garcia said, “I’m not a criminal. I would never hurt my father. I love my father.”

Garcia’s elderly father is an Alzheimer’s patient who owes nearly $20,000 to an Elkhorn nursing home. She’s accused of using his retirement money to pay her own bills instead of his.

Douglas county attorney Don Kleine said, “They’re being taken advantage of, they’re being exploited by someone who understands they have this amount of money and take it from them not for the benefit of the person who has the incapacity but for themselves.”

Garcia’s attorney James Martin Davis says the charge of Abuse of a Vulnerable Adult isn’t fair in this case.

Davis said, “Because you don’t know what you can do pursuant to Medicare rules doesn’t mean if you stumble you are criminally liable.”
Garcia said, “I didn’t really understand what could be paid or couldn’t be paid or if I did something incorrectly I’m sorry for that and I’ll pay if back.”

The arrest affidavit states Garcia used $8,700 of her father’s retirement money to pay her own business phone service. She declined to provide the nature of the business. However Channel Six News found the business listed in the adult entertainment section of the yellow pages. Dancers for bachelor and bachelorette parties are among the services listed in that section.

Garcia said, “I used to run a business out of my house. I had to leave my home to take care of my father. So yes I ran the business out of his house.”

The county attorney is concerned that if Garcia’s father can’t pay his nursing home bill then taxpayers will have to pick up the cost.
Garcia claims the government is in the process of seizing her father’s home to pay for his nursing home cost.

If convicted of the charge of Abuse of a Vulnerable Adult she faces u to five years in prison.