LANSING — Attorney General Dana Nessel announced felony charges against a Clare businessman Wednesday for his involvement in a $25 million state-funded development that never broke ground.
David Coker Jr. is charged with conducting a criminal enterprise, embezzlement and misuse of public funds in connection with a health facility project that Nessel says Coker never planned to build.
Before receiving the state budget appropriation, Coker was an aide to former Republican State House Speaker Jason Wentworth from Clare.
Nessel claims that Coker designed the Clare health center project with the goal of enriching himself.
“The project was developed and set out in search of funding,” she said.
Nessel says Coker first formed the nonprofit organization Complete Health Park in June of 2022, just a month before the group was awarded millions in taxpayer dollars.
“This organization doesn’t even exist. They have no track record,” Nessel said. “They can’t show that they’ve done anything in terms of major projects that have been successful.”
Coker was also the head of a for-profit business that billed Complete Health Park over $800,000 worth of consulting fees in December of 2022.
Coker signed the documents necessary to claim those funds later in December of 2022 and received nearly $10 million in January of 2023, while not disclosing that he was in control of both entities.
Nessel says that Coker “immediately” transferred that money into the business’s bank account, followed by transfers into his own personal accounts.
Coker “very soon began paying off his personal debts and making extravagant purchases with that money, such as four vehicles,” Nessel said.
The development was supposed to contain facilities aimed at improving the mental and physical health of people in Clare.
Nessel says the land for the project was purchased for $3.5 million from Tom Kunse, the current state representative for Clare, who was then a private citizen.
“I don’t believe there’s any way that this project, as it’s described in the grant, could possibly have been completed with the $25 million that was appropriated,” Nessel said.
Coker was arrested and arraigned in Lansing District Court Wednesday.
He has been charged with six felonies and one high misdemeanor, most of which carry potential 20-year sentences.
Nessel says that Wentworth and Kunse were both cooperative with investigators and are not suspected of any wrongdoing. The investigation has now been closed, she said.
Kunse and Wentworth both said in statements that they were thankful for Nessel’s work.
Coker’s attorney did not respond to requests for comment.