CHICAGO — A federal grand jury in Chicago, Illinois, returned an indictment on February 15, charging the former Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of a Chicago area hospital with three counts of mail fraud and three counts of money laundering.
According to the indictment, beginning in or around December 2013 and continuing until in or around July 2021, ROBERT SPADONI, 58, of Darien defrauded the Chicago area hospital out of approximately $622,500. Despite being required to comply with the hospital’s conflict of interest policy, which prohibited, among other things, employees and their family members from having a financial interest in an organization doing and seeking to do business with the hospital, Spadoni caused the hospital to enter into a professional services agreement with Medical Education Solutions (MES), a company established by Spadoni. The contract between the hospital system and MES was for MES to provide administrative support and compliance services to the hospital’s podiatry residency program.
The indictment alleges that, under the terms of the MES agreement, the hospital agreed to pay $6,500 per month for the purported services Spadoni knew would not be provided by MES. Spadoni concealed, and attempted to conceal, his and a family member’s financial interest in MES, providing a direct report with a $1,500 monthly cash payment in order to perform the administrative support and compliance services that were covered by the MES agreement. Spadoni and the family member are alleged to have used the remaining funds obtained from the hospital for their own personal benefit and the personal benefit of others.
Arraignment in federal court has not yet been scheduled.
The indictment was announced by John R. Lausch, Jr., United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois; Robert W. Wheeler, Jr, Special Agent-in-Charge of the Chicago Field Office of the FBI; and Kwame Raoul, Illinois Attorney General. The government is represented by Assistant U.S. Attorney Chester Choi.
The public is reminded that an indictment contains only a charge and is not evidence of guilt. The defendant is presumed innocent and is entitled to a fair trial at which the government has the burden of proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Each count of mail fraud is punishable by up to 20 years in federal prison and each count of money laundering is punishable by up to 10 years in federal prison. If convicted, the Court must impose a reasonable sentence under federal statutes and the advisory U.S. Sentencing Guidelines.