Authorities are seeking a former Highmark Health employee in South Carolina who they say used her job with the health care giant to withdraw or attempt to withdraw nearly $90,000 from eight victims’ health savings accounts.
Zakayah A. Scott, 23, of Columbia, S.C., has been charged with nine counts of identity theft, eight counts each of access device fraud and criminal attempt, five counts of theft by unlawful taking, four counts of criminal conspiracy and a lone count of unlawful use of a computer.
The Allegheny County District Attorney’s Office filed charges against Scott on Thursday, but she was not in custody, court records show. No attorney for Scott was listed in court records.
Highmark, a Pittsburgh-based health care company that is one of the largest Blue Cross/Blue Shield insurers in the United States, is “aware that a former employee, who resigned earlier this year, is facing a criminal complaint related to allegations of theft and fraud,” spokesperson Leilyn Perri told the Tribune-Review.
Highmark would not confirm any additional details of the case.
“We are thoroughly reviewing this ongoing investigation and have a number of systems in place to protect our members from fraudulent activity,” Perri said.
Scott, in her position with Highmark, “had access to personal identifying information for the eight victims” and accessed a few of those victims’ accounts when she had no reason to access them, according to a criminal complaint filed in the case.
Scott did not work alone, authorities said. Police identified Unique Waymer, Bermonte Gilmore, Jahkheme Scott and Tyron Keller as co-conspirators.
They contacted Highmark customer service, reset the victims’ passwords and logged into the victims’ accounts, the complaint said. In 2022 and 2023, they withdrew $33,774 from those accounts and attempted to withdraw an additional $54,600, using the proceeds “for their own personal benefit,” according to the complaint.
Scott worked as a Highmark Health employee from April 18, 2022, through January 25, 2023, and worked remotely from her home in South Carolina, the complaint said. Through her job, she had access to customers’ dates of birth, addresses and phone numbers. She did not have access to usernames and passwords.
Scott voluntarily resigned from her position earlier this year, and “it was believed that the actor knew that she was going to be disciplined and/or terminated from her position by Highmark Health,” the complaint said.
Authorities issued a search warrant to track Scott’s IP address, which is a unique string of characters that identifies a computer using the internet. Highmark said in a police report that three victims’ HSAs were accessed in January through Scott’s IP address.
One type of Health Savings Account is considered a “cash” account, which people can use to purchase prescriptions or health care-related supplies, and the second type is an “investment” account, which only is used if a person’s account stores more than $500, Highmark said in documents provided to the district attorney’s office.
The cash account is FDIC-insured, while the investment account is not, the district attorney’s office said.
Justin Vellucci is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Justin at jvellucci@triblive.com.
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