The IRS stated it caught scammers who stole greater than $1.8 billion from federal COVID-19 reduction funds meant to assist small companies and employees affected by the pandemic.
The huge quantity of theft was uncovered over two years by IRS legal investigations into more than 660 tax and money-laundering cases involving stimulus funds doled out as loans, credit and funds, the IRS stated Wednesday.
The entire quantity stolen from the federal authorities’s $2 trillion in pandemic assist could also be many occasions larger. Again in December, the U.S. Secret Service estimated that at least $100 billion had been stolen from COVID-19 reduction applications, principally from unemployment fraud. That determine didn’t embody instances like these uncovered by the IRS and prosecuted by the Justice Division.
“Sadly, even throughout occasions of disaster, criminals pop their heads out to search for methods to benefit from these of their most weak state,” Jim Lee, chief of IRS legal investigations, stated in a statement.
The IRS stated it has had a 100% conviction fee for scammers who’ve been prosecuted, with jail sentences averaging 42 months.
The fraud concerned cash appropriated by the Coronavirus Assist, Aid and Financial Safety Act, or CARES, signed into legislation two years in the past in response to the pandemic. The measure licensed greater than $2 trillion in assist.
Lots of these the IRS caught scamming submitted fraudulent Paycheck Safety Program mortgage functions that cited pretend companies and workers. Some have been accused of utilizing the taxpayer cash for lavish spending sprees, buying luxuries like Lamborghinis, Rolex watches, designer purses and homes. After coming beneath suspicion, others tried to fake their own death or flee the country.
The Justice Division’s legal division last month reported recovering greater than $75 million in money plundered from PPP funds, in addition to actual property and luxurious gadgets bought with fraudulent proceeds. The property have been seized in instances involving greater than 150 defendants in 95 legal instances.
