A 53-year-old Dalton Gardens man who defrauded the government of $7,492 in Medicaid payments will be placed on probation as part of a plea agreement.

Eric Ralph Nelson was sentenced Thursday in Coeur d’Alene to two years on probation as part of a four-year prison sentence that includes two years fixed and two years indeterminate if he fails to live up to the probation agreement.

Attorneys argued that it was Nelson’s first felony offense. Despite devising a plan to illegally collect Medicaid checks for several months in 2015, it was out of character for Nelson, who blamed his ex-wife.

“He seems to take some responsibility, but shirks some of it off onto his ex-wife,” said Rondee Blessing, a deputy prosecutor with the attorney general’s office.

According to the complaint, which charged Nelson with 26 felony counts of defrauding Idaho Medicaid, “during a period of time from on or about February 22, 2015, to May 16, 2015 … (Eric Nelson) did knowingly and with the intent to defraud, by means of willful false statement or representation or by deliberate concealment of a material fact, or any other fraudulent scheme or device …”

Nelson used falsified billing statements to ensure Medicaid cut checks to someone referred to in the complaint as “R.O.,” and then had the payments payable to Nelson, according to the complaint.

The attorney general’s office asked an affidavit not be disclosed to the public because of Medicaid information, identification numbers and provider information. Instead of ordering redactions, a First District Magistrate judge sealed the affidavit, preventing the public from seeing it.

Defense attorneys asked for a withheld judgment, which could have resulted in the charges being wiped from the public record, but First District Judge Cynthia K.C. Meyer denied the request.

“I am not going to withhold judgment,” Meyer said. “Anytime fraud is committed on an entity like Medicaid, it affects the entire community.”

Meyer said she would give the crime the weight it deserves.

“Excuses were made,” she said. “There wasn’t any real acknowledgement of responsibility.”

She ordered a $1,000 fine, and that Nelson repay the amount stolen from Medicaid. The judge also ordered 30 days local jail, allowing Nelson to do his time, beginning Jan. 10, on the weekends.