In a COVID-19-related relief scam that cost the U.S. Small Business Administration close to $1.7 million loss, a former civilian employee of the Mount Vernon Police Department and her daughter had their requests for leniency denied on April 26, 2024. They were sentenced to jail sentences.
Andrea Ayers, who led the city’s CSEA union, received a 3 1/2-year jail term from U.S. District Judge Nelson Roman. Alicia Ayers, her daughter and an accountant and financial advisor, was sentenced to two years in jail followed by six months of home detention. The two ladies from Mount Vernon fraudulently applied hundreds of times to the SBA’s Economic Injury Disaster Loan program, hoping to get $10,000 in grants for friends, family, and coworkers. When the money was disbursed, they received kickbacks. When practically none of the applicants had any businesses, they fraudulently claimed that they were the owners of eligible companies with at least ten employees.
- Advertisement -
U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said in a recent statement, “These defendants stole from a taxpayer-funded program intended to help small businesses that were in desperate need of assistance during the COVID-19 pandemic.” He added, “As their convictions and sentences reflect, my Office is determined to continue to work to bring to justice those who exploit and defraud government programs during a national emergency.”
After being detained in March 2021, the mother and daughter were charged with money laundering, conspiracy to conduct wire fraud, and making false statements four months later. They entered a guilty plea to these charges last year. While prosecutors sought a sentence of between 5 1/3 and 6 1/2 years in jail, they asked for home confinement.
In early summer 2020, for three weeks, the two produced statistics for their “businesses” and used people’s bank account information and pedigrees to make 315 applications for the maximum awards. It would have cost the SBA more than $3.1 million if everything had been authorized. Recipients were instructed to donate $3,000 to the Ayerses after receiving their $10,000.
The amount of money the defendants got in bribes from the more than 165 applications that were approved was not disclosed in court records, but if it was, it would have totaled almost $500,000.
As a condition of entering guilty pleas, they each gave up $1.69 million. Roman also mandated that everyone make compensation to the SBA in the same amount. He gave them till August 2nd to appear in jail.
Since the defendants knew the applicants were either sole owners with much less than ten workers, or that they had no business at all, they never inquired about the applicants’ specifics. Additionally, they never disclosed to the public that they were submitting fictitious applications using their information. Prosecutors said in court records that the applicants were repeatedly tricked into believing they were eligible as homeowners or tenants.
An acquaintance named Traci Proctor, who was also detained with the Ayerses but was not charged later, helped the two with finding people and submitting applications. She entered a guilty plea as well, although she has not yet received a punishment.
Andrea Ayers was employed by Mount Vernon from 2013 to March 2023. She ran Annie’s Dream Cuisine, a catering company, and served as a code enforcement officer for the police force. ANA Financial Services was managed by Alicia Ayers, a Stamford resident as well. She was a prominent presenter on Mount Vernon’s Financial Freedom webinar series the same week that she and her mother started the EIDL fraud.
Defense attorneys used the defendants’ regret, their lack of criminal history, and their family duties as reasons in court filings to argue that their clients should not go to jail. Prosecutors, however, responded that the scheme’s blatant avarice and brazenness demonstrated the necessity for a term that would discourage others from scamming government aid programs.
Additionally, they informed Roman that neither lady had paid back any of the loans and that they had neglected to submit the financial documentation that probation had required to determine their assets. The judge had to weigh the lowest end of the sentencing guidelines, which was a 5 1/3-year jail sentence suggested by probation. Jacob Carter, a resident of the city, and his buddy Quadri and Anwar Salahuddin were found guilty because of a wider plot that was underway in Mount Vernon at the same time. After submitting over 1,000 fraudulent applications, they defrauded the SBA of about $8 million. Most likely, they took home a cool $2–$3 million. Next month, they are due to be sentenced.
