ATLANTA — Police say a woman accused of posing as a nurse and giving hospice care to Bobbi Kristina Brown faces identity fraud and other charges.
Roswell Police Department Officer Lisa Holland says Taiwo Sobamowo of Buford has also been charged with forgery, theft by deception and practicing as a professional registered nurse without a license.
Her former employer, Homestead Hospice, is based in Roswell 20 miles north of Atlanta.
Brown, the 22-year-old daughter of singers Bobby Brown and the late Whitney Houston, died July 26 at Peachtree Christian Hospice in Duluth, Georgia. Sobamowo's employer contracted staff who worked at the hospice center.
Sobamowo was arrested in November and faces similar charges in Forsyth County and Duluth.
She remained in jail on Friday. No attorney is listed for her in online court records.
Sobamowo, 32, was arrested last month in Raleigh, N.C., on a warrant issued by the Forsyth County Sheriff’s Office, according to the Raleigh/Wake City-County Bureau of Identification.
She reportedly had a second possible residence in Raleigh and was found at the house after a rental car with a Georgia tag was recorded rented under “one of her alias names.”
Forsyth County Sheriff’s officials have said Sobamowo did not have a nursing license but supposedly practiced as a registered professional nurse at Gracemont Senior Living off Jot Em Down Road near Ga. 400.
The agency also issued warrants for her on felony charges of financial identity fraud and forgery as she “provided fraudulent credentials under a different name to gain employment …and is not licensed in the state of Georgia or elsewhere in the United States.”
According to a multi-jurisdictional investigation, she supposedly used the licensing information of a metro Atlanta medical professional who was not aware her identity had been stolen prior to the Forsyth County investigation.
The woman reportedly confirmed to law enforcement that she does not know Sobamowo or allow her license information to be used by anyone.
Sobamowo was held at the Wake County Detention Facility in Raleigh before being transferred Wednesday to the Forsyth County Jail.
Sobamowo is also the subject of a separate probe for her employment at Peachtree Christian Hospice off Peachtree Industrial Boulevard and Pleasant Hill Road in Duluth.
The center is where 22-year-old Bobbi Kristina Brown resided at the time of her death in July. She was the daughter of Houston and fellow singer Bobby Brown.
In late January, Bobbi Kristina Brown was found unresponsive in a bathtub and was kept in a medically induced coma until her death. She had been named as the sole beneficiary of her mother’s estate after Houston’s death in 2012.
According to the Associated Press, Mariam “Lola” Savage, a friend of Sobamowo, said she visited her in early September and was told by her friend that she had been caring for Bobbi Kristina.
“Duluth police began investigating this matter on Oct. 27 after being notified by Forsyth County authorities of their investigative findings,” said Don Woodruff, a spokesman for the Duluth Police Department.
“Duluth obtained a warrant for practicing as a registered professional nurse without a license. Additional charges may be forthcoming.”
Woodruff said Duluth investigators are “looking at her involvement” at the hospice.
A police report shows no indication that Brown’s care was affected by Sobamowo.
Paula Sanders, executive director of the Georgia Hospice and Palliative Care Organization, which contracts nurses to the centers involved in Sobamowo’s case, said registered nurses in hospice facilities will bathe, change and feed a patient or make sure those tasks happen.
Responsibilities also include providing medication, providing updates and making conversation with patients and their family members to ensure their comfort.
Sobamowo was hired by Homestead Hospice in September 2014 and fired on Aug. 5 when she failed to provide proof of a license, according to the Georgia Board of Nursing.
“She doesn’t have any credentials to work there,” Woodruff said. “She’s not a nurse, so anything she may have done there may be criminal activity.”
He said her employment records indicated she attended a medical college in Washington, D.C.
“To date,” he said, “we have been unable to confirm her attendance at this school.”
A cease-and-desist order issued by the DC Department of Health, according to the AP, says an August 2013 background check showed Sobamowo had been convicted of check forgery and other offenses in Minnesota.
She also apparently faced charges of theft in Maryland and a charge of passing a bad check in Missouri.