Former IHC worker charged

A former retirement account/fund director for Intermountain Health Care was charged Tuesday in 3rd District Court with embezzling more than $2.6 million from the company over the past eight years.

Ralph Jay Hansen, 52, was charged with nine counts of theft and one count of money laundering, all second-degree felonies.

A $100,000 arrest warrant was issued for Hansen Tuesday. As of Tuesday afternoon he had not been booked into the Salt Lake County Jail.

Hansen is accused of using money earmarked for trust and retirement funds for his own personal gain, according to court documents. He allegedly used some of that money for "supporting sports organizations, home improvements, travel, mortgage payments and the like," court documents state.

IHC found evidence of the alleged embezzlement during an internal audit in March. It appeared that over a period of eight years beginning in 1996 about $2.6 million was diverted from the administrative funds of IHC retirement plans, IHC spokesman Daron Cowley said.

IHC turned the results of its in-house investigation over to the Salt Lake County District Attorney's Office, according to IHC attorney John Nielsen, who issued a statement on behalf of the company.

Hansen, a midlevel employee in IHC Human Resources Department since 1990, was fired in March after the internal investigation, according to Nielsen.

None of the money actually came from individual employee retirement contributions, Cowley said. It was all from the administrative funds and has been replaced. A small amount of the money has been recovered, and IHC and the insurance it carried made up the rest of the money, Cowley said.

Hansen's job put him in a position to approve payment of invoices for administrative services to operate the retirement plans, Nielsen said.

The statement from IHC said that Hansen allegedly "used a sophisticated scheme" to embezzle the money and that Hansen "worked meticulously to hide his actions from his supervisors and co-workers." It is believed that Hansen acted alone, Nielsen said.

He also noted IHC "requires honesty and integrity of its employees and has a policy of vigorously prosecuting individuals who violate that policy."

The missing money was discovered by an audit commenced by the United State Department of Labor. That audit uncovered numerous payments for services to a company called FCG Diversified Communications that "were not supported by documents showing work done for IHC," according to court documents.