Twin brothers from Maryland have won a million dollars and bought a shiny new sports car after the COVID-19 program, but alas, they got caught.
Jerry and Jalel Phillps, both 24, “face federal charges for allegedly obtaining payments totaling more than $1 million in COVID-19 unemployment insurance benefits and loans,” as the relayed the daily thread.
The twins then used some of that cold, hard COVID-related money to buy a 2020 Camaro, as well as to trade cryptocurrency, according to the US Department of Justice. They appeared in US District Court in Greenbelt, Maryland on Wednesday.
It seems that their chances of avoiding prison are not very good.
U.S. Attorney Erek L. Barron for the District of Maryland, along with officials from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and the Department of Labor, detailed the following in a DOJ Press release:
“According to the criminal complaint, the IP addresses linked to Jaleel and Jerry Phillips were used to submit fraudulent Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loan applications, Economic Disaster Loan (EIDL) applications and unemployment insurance claims resulting in $1 million in funds received.
“As stated in the affidavit in support of the criminal complaint, the Phillips brothers allegedly created fictitious pseudonyms, used the personal identifying information of real people, and used fake businesses or legal entities to apply for EIDL loans and PPP, and unemployment benefits. .”
Of course, this is nothing new. One of the widely undersold results of the pandemic is that people are trying to use it to profit financially. Some surely got away with it.
As the Daily Wire rated“Nearly two years after the government approved aid totaling more than $6 trillion, the U.S. government is now held accountable for where the funds go.”
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