An Atlanta man is facing many years in prison after persuading his mother and elderly grandmother to buy fancy cars in order to launder money from a drug-smuggling business.
The Atlanta man faces restitution charges of tens of thousands of dollars after committing fraud while on bail for those offenses. Officials say this is all the result of a joint investigation by the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Fulton County Sheriff’s Department, 11alive reported.
According to the United States, this has been the case since at least 2010. A press release with the Department of Justice said the individual has sold cocaine by the kilogram in the Atlanta region. He picked up and delivered bags of cash and narcotics to other members of his drug trafficking business, as well as buying and selling cocaine to his own customers.
Police said he was caught on bank surveillance cameras putting money into accounts controlled by other members of the gang. He also sent money from the operation to his associates via wire transfer.
According to Erskine, the guy persuaded his mother and grandmother to buy a series of fancy automobiles in their own names in order to launder financial gains from the drug trafficking organization.
In 2018, he was charged with conspiracy to possess with the purpose to distribute cocaine and money laundering by a federal grand jury. The man was arrested the next month and freed on bail while the accusations were being investigated.
Florida man charged with PPP loan fraud
Meanwhile, according to a Hillsborough County State Attorney’s press release, a Tampa court sentenced a St. Petersburg man to three years and six months in federal prison on Tuesday for unlawfully collecting money via several COVID-19 relief programs. Louis Thornton III, 63, admitted to collecting $814,632 through a wire fraud scheme on September 13.
According to court records, Thornton made false applications for EIDL (Economic Injury Disaster Loan) and PPP (Paycheck Protection Programs) loans on behalf of many dead enterprises using the SBA’s online EIDL site from April to July 2020. Thornton’s applications falsely stated that these enterprises were active and had incurred economic losses as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, among other substantial misrepresentations, as per Yahoo News.
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