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SALT LAKE CITY — A Spanish Fork man who had already been convicted in two separate fraud cases was sentenced Friday to an additional year of imprisonment after he was found guilty of new fraud charges committed during the trial for previous charges.
Matthew Ambrose Baker, 49, was sentenced to house arrest in 2019 after he was found guilty of using his Provo hospice care business, Sunrise Home Health & Hospice LLC, to "conceal and hide his money and assets to avoid paying Medicare and Medicaid for overpayments and damages," by creating businesses in a family member's name and using them to conduct transactions. In that case, the state ended up trying recover around $1.8 million for overpayment and $3.7 million for double damages recovery, prosecutors said.
In September 2020, Baker was placed on pretrial release as he was being investigated for attempting to divert money from a family member's real estate transaction to himself while under house arrest. As a condition of his release, Baker was ordered not to transfer substantial assets over $1,500, unless approved by a U.S. probation officer.
Between August 2021 and February 2022, court documents say Baker transferred more than $1 million in assets without obtaining approval from his supervision officer, and without notifying the supervision officer of the transfers. In March 2022, probation officers found ammunition in a sock drawer and a duffel bag, as well as $80,000 cash, according to court documents.
A federal jury found Baker guilty of two counts of wire fraud for the real estate case in December 2022, and he was sentenced to 27 months' imprisonment and ordered to pay his family member $445,000 in restitution.
On Friday, a judge sentenced Baker to another year in prison with three years of probation for charges of contempt and being a felon in possession of ammunition, resulting in a total prison sentence of 39 months with three years probation after.
U.S. Attorney Trina Higgins for the District of Utah called the behavior "brazen," saying Baker's "repeated maleficence" demonstrated "a complete lack of respect for our laws and the court."
