Stephanie Dorisca {BSO}
A federal jury found a Coral Springs woman guilty of conspiracy to commit wire fraud as part of a college diploma-mill scheme she helped run while serving as director of a South Florida nursing school program, authorities said.
Stephanie Dorisca, 57, was convicted of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and multiple counts of wire fraud earlier this month during a trial in federal court in Fort Lauderdale, according to court records.
Dorisca, formerly the head of nursing at Techni-Pro Institute, a nursing school in Boca Raton, conspired with the institute’s owner and school recruiters in a scheme that netted millions of dollars from the sale of around 1,000 falsified college nursing diplomas, which were sold to nursing students recruited by the school from out of state, according to federal prosecutors.
Dorisca and her co-conspirators also sold phony educational transcripts to the nursing students they targeted for recruitment, along with other fake credentials. Later, they helped the students fraudulently obtain licensure and employment in the healthcare field, prosecutors said.
Fraudulent documents sold to the students showed they “had completed the necessary courses and/or clinical training at Techni-Pro to obtain nursing degrees, when in fact the purchasers had never completed the necessary courses and/or clinical training,” according to court records.
Techni-Pro offered college degrees in Practical Nursing, Associate of Science in Nursing, and Registered Nurse to Bachelor of Science programs.
Under state law, Florida nursing programs must devote at least 50% of their curriculum to hands-on clinical training, in addition to academic coursework, for a practical nursing education program, an associate degree in professional nursing program, or a professional diploma in nursing education program.
The scheme executed by Dorisca and her conspirators helped students skip that vital training and coursework, authorities said.
Dorisca faces up to 20 years in prison at sentencing.
Her conviction was part of a sprawling crackdown by federal authorities known as “Operation Nightingale,” which targeted several dozen private, for-profit nursing schools across South Florida. Owners and employees of those schools were caught peddling phony college diplomas and other fake credentials to would-be nurses looking to enter the profession.
The cases brought by prosecutors highlighted “the purpose of a professional nursing licensure: protecting the public from harm by ensuring that only qualified and competent practitioners provide nursing care … nursing is a profession that, if practiced by unprepared or unqualified individuals, poses a serious risk to public health and safety,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office said in a written statement.
According to the Miami Herald, in total, the diploma mill conspirators prosecuted by the government sold about 15,000 fake diplomas, at $10,000 to $20,000 per diploma, netting criminals a total of more than $220 million for falsified degrees and transcripts.
All of the nursing schools targeted by the government have since closed, prosecutors said.
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