BROWN COUNTY (NBC 26) — A Brown County man has been charged in connection with running an overcrowded adult family home, abuse of a resident, submitting fake documents and tax evasion.
According to a news release from the Wisconsin Department of Justice, Lerenzo Head, 36, of De Pere was charged in connection with three alleged schemes concerning two adult family homes that he owned and operated in Brown County.
The DOJ also said Head was also charged in a separate criminal complaint with allegedly under-reporting or failing to report his income on his state income taxes over three years.
According to the criminal complaints, in the summer of 2018, workers from Brown County Adult Protective Services received a report that a resident of one of the homes went to a community service group with feces on his hat.
The DOJ says APS workers made an unannounced visit and discovered that all the residents from both of Head’s adult family homes were living together in one home, over the legal limit for occupancy for a licensed adult family home.
Authorities said an investigation by the DOJ and Brown County Sheriff's Office revealed that the aforementioned resident was often locked in his bedroom and had to use a bucket as a toilet. The DOJ said Head allegedly submitted false records to the Department of Health Services to make it seem as though Head was adequately training his employees.
The DOJ's news release also says that Head allegedly filed fraudulent income tax returns for 2016 and 2017. Head also failed to file an income tax return in 2018. Based on the income that Head received as the owner of two adult family homes over that time, he failed to report more than $600,000 in income on his taxes.
The DOJ says the cases are being prosecuted by Assistant Attorney General Timothy J. Filipa from the DOJ Medicaid Fraud Control and Elder Abuse Unit. DOJ says it's also providing victim's services.
