A brother and sister have been sentenced after ripping off an insurance company while they were living in The Villages.
Sophie Nassif Bolous, 74, pleaded no contest this past week in Sumter County Court to a charge of grand theft. She has been placed on probation for two years and will have to perform 70 hours of community service.
Last month, her brother, 82-year-old Youseff El-Masry, was ordered to make restitution in the amount of $113,625 to Genworth Insurance. He has been placed on probation for 30 years.
The brother and sister, who are from Egypt, were both living in Villa Vera Cruz in the Village of Santiago, when El-Masry filed claims with the insurance company claiming he had hired Bolous to care for his ailing wife. Bolous claimed she had provided care for her sister-in-law at the rate of $25 per hour. She also claimed she was not related to her by either blood or marriage, according to an investigation by the Florida Department of Financial Services Division of Investigative and Forensic Services. Bolous said she was providing care 78 hours per week.
Genworth Insurance on May 12, 2021 initiated a “care call” with El-Masry who had Bolous with him on speaker phone. El-Masry, who emigrated to the United States in 1968 and spent many years in Chicago, told the insurance company representative that Bolous’ “English is not the best,” the report said. The call was conducted on a recorded line. Bolous claimed she was working about 10 hours per day, helping her sister-in-law get out of bed and go to the bathroom. Bolous also said she helped bathe her and get her to the dinner table. An investigator later analyzed the call and determined that Bolous was “being coached.”
When an investigator went to Bolous’ home, she was confronted with the fact she had been making $1,800 per week providing care for her sister-in-law.
El-Masry has been in the headlines due his fierce battle last year with the Community Development District 2 Board of Supervisors in a bid to save an illicit addition he made to his home without the approval of the Architectural Review Committee. He claimed he made the addition to house his ailing wife.
El-Masry also owned a villa at 2166 Estevez Drive that was the subject of a deed compliance case in 2020.
El-Masry still owns the villas, but he indicated in a letter sent to the court that he is now living in Fruitland Park.
