LOS ANGELES — Yellowstone actor Q’Orianka Kilcher has been charged with illegally collecting nearly $97,000 in disability benefits while working on the TV show, authorities announced Monday.
Kilcher, 32, of North Hollywood, is charged with two felony counts of workers’ compensation insurance fraud, according to a statement from the California Department of Insurance.
Kilcher played Angela Blue Thunder in four episodes on the Paramount Network Western. It aired from 2020 to Kevin Costner.
In 2005, she also played Pocahontas. The New World and was in 2019’s Dora and The Lost City of Gold.
When you are working DoraThe insurance department stated that Kilcher had allegedly hurt her neck and right shoulder in October 2018.
A year later, Kilcher told a doctor handling the insurance claim that she had been offered work but could not take it because of severe neck pain from her injury, according to the insurance department’s statement.
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Kilcher was awarded $96,838 of temporary disability benefits between 2019 and 2021. An investigation revealed that Kilcher was a former employee of the company. YellowstoneThe department claimed that her claim to disability was valid for several months, in 2019, during which she said she was totally disabled.
“According to records, she returned to the doctor and started receiving disability benefits five days after last working on the show,” the statement said.
According to the statement, Kilcher turned in his surrender and was charged with the offenses in May.
Michael Becker her attorney stated that Kilcher was in the passenger seat of a production car when Kilcher was hurt.
“Third-party doctors verified her injury and entitlement to benefits. Ms. Kilcher was at all times candid with her doctors and treatment providers…and she never intentionally accepted benefits that she did not believe she was entitled to,” Becker said.
Kilcher will “vigorously defend herself and asks that she be afforded the presumption of innocence both in and outside the courthouse,” Becker said.
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