Office of $2.3M Oregon Medicaid provider with alleged gang ties closed
Neighbors of alleged former Tren de Aragua house in Lake Oswego report ambulance visits, fast motorcycles, "trashed" house, landlord on speed dial
The Portland office of the Oregon company that received over $2.3 million in Medicaid reimbursements for addiction recovery services in less than a year, ending just three days after King County, Washington prosecutors charged a man who lived in the company’s Lake Oswego halfway house with kidnapping, torturing and attempted murder of a Seattle woman, was closed yesterday and vacant except for several mattresses and large black trash bags filled with unknown items.
Oregon Roundup exclusively reported Sunday about the Medicaid payments to a company that allegedly housed alleged attempted murderers.
Paper signs affixed to the locked door facing N Broadway were all that announced it as the location of Uplifting Journey LLC. My visit occurred during a time one of the signs said the business was open. The door was locked. My calls to Uplifting Journey went unanswered.
I contacted the management company for the property to determine whether Uplifting Journey continued to rent the office, but have not heard back as of publication.
Uplifting Journey was certified by the Oregon Health Authority to receive Medicaid reimbursements in December 2023. The form submitted to OHA by Uplifting Journey to obtain the certification included the note, “Would appreciate rapid processing time, ready to render service to patients,” according to documents produced to me by OHA late yesterday afternoon pursuant to a long-pending public records request. OHA had emailed me August 8 to tell me “Uplifting Journey is not a certified/licensed entity” and produced the certification to me yesterday without explanation.
In April 2024, Uplifting Journey began receiving Medicaid reimbursements from OHA, eventually totalling $2,317,496.20.
Tren de Oswego
Also yesterday, I paid a visit to the Bonita Road house that was the residence of Kevin Daniel Sanabria-Ojeda, the alleged attempted murderer, in January of this year when prosecutors say Sanabria-Ojeda drove with associates, including another, unidentified, man also living in the Bonita Road house, to Seattle where they allegedly kidnapped, tortured with a power drill to the hand, robbed, shot and left for dead Maria Guadalupe Hernandez Velasquez, who somehow survived.
Prosecutors allege Sanabria-Ojeda and his unnamed roommate were members of the Venezuelan drug- and human-trafficking gang Tren de Aragua.
As first reported by Katie Daviscourt of The Post Millenial, Lake Oswego police had made some 17 trips to the Bonita Road house to respond to neighbor complaints of strange night time activity and a woman screaming at night. Residents of the house informed police the house was managed by Uplifting Journey. A man named “Julius” interacted with police on behalf of Uplifting Journey. One of the owners of Uplifting Journey goes by the name “Julius Maximo,” according to Oregon business records.
A woman answering the door at the house located near Interstate 5 on the outskirts of Lake Oswego, an affluent Portland suburb, said her boyfriend and other roommates moved into the house around the first week of June to find the house “trashed.” She had no knowledge of the prior tenants, but had assumed they were college students based on the condition of the property.
As reported exclusively by Oregon Roundup Sunday, Oregon Health Authority Medicaid payments to Uplifting Journey began in April 2024 and concluded abruptly March 14, 2025, three days after King County prosecutors charged Sanabria-Ojeda with the attempted murder of Maria Guadalupe Hernandez Velasquez.
Neighbors of the Bonita Road house told me yesterday a man named “Julius” told them the house was operated as a halfway house for people stuggling with drugs and alcohol. The Oregon Medicaid payments to Uplifting Journey were coded as drug and alcohol counseling reimbursements, according to state records obtained by Oregon Roundup via public records request.
Neighbors said ambulances came to the Uplifting Journey house on several occasions, and both men and women came and went from the house frequently. One male who lived in the house had a motorcycle he rode fast down the street, which is marked 25 miles per hour. They told me the tenants associated with “Julius” moved out around April 1 of this year, weeks after Sanabria-Ojeda was charged.
Neighbors had the phone number of the owner of the house used by Uplifting Journey on speed dial due to the frequency of calls related to issues at the property. The owner, Lei Mei, declined to confirm whether Uplifting Journey had been a tenant, when that tenancy might have ended, and what were the circumstances of the termination of Uplifting Journey’s tenancy.
This is a developing story.
Dubious Chinese landlord rents to dubious African scammers who get funding from dubious socialized "health" organization, and nothing will be done about it. Sounds like another typical day in Oregon.
Keep after it Jeff. I have a hunch our dear State has many more tales just waiting for their rock to be overturned.