By TOMMY REZAC
St. Joseph Post
The co-founder of a so-called Christian health care sharing ministry in St. Joseph was sentenced in federal court Wednesday for his role in an $8 million wire fraud conspiracy that cheated hundreds of members, and to making false statements on a personal tax return.
Sixty-two-year-old Craig Anthony Reynolds of St. Joseph was sentenced to 17.5 years in federal prison without parole. Reynolds was taken into custody at the conclusion of a Wednesday hearing to start serving his sentence. The court also ordered Reynolds to pay more than $8 million in restitution to the victims, the IRS and the Missouri Department of Revenue.
The court also ordered Reynolds to forfeit to the government more than $460,000, which includes proceeds from the sale of a St. Joseph residence and other assets.
Reynolds founded and ran Medical Cost Sharing, a tax-exempt organization, as its president and CEO from 2014-2022. Reynolds pleaded guilty last November to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and one count of making false statements on a tax return.
In a separate but related case, co-defendant and 77-year-old James L. McGinnis of St. Joseph, pleaded guilty on April 2nd to the same charges and awaits sentencing. McGinnis co-founded Medical Cost Sharing.
Reynolds and McGinnis collected more than $8 million in member “contributions,” yet paid only 3.1 percent in health care claims so that they could personally profit and take most of the members’ contributions for themselves.