Reports

BOSTON – Two former owners of massage parlors have been charged in connection with filing for and obtaining fraudulent pandemic-related loans under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act for their respective illicit businesses where workers engaged in commercial sex acts with customers.

A former California Employment Development Department (EDD) employee has agreed to plead guilty to a federal criminal charge for causing nearly 200 fraudulent COVID-related unemployment relief claims to be filed in other people’s names, resulting in more than $1.6 million in ill-gotten gains, the Justice Department announced today.

Christopher A. Parris, 41, formerly of Rochester, New York, and currently of Lawrenceville, Georgia, pleaded guilty today to conspiracy to commit mail fraud related to a Ponzi scheme, as well as to wire fraud involving the fraudulent sale of purported N95 masks during the pandemic.

BOSTON – A Quincy man was sentenced yesterday in federal court in Boston in connection with selling lanyards that falsely claimed to protect against viruses.

A federal criminal complaint has been filed charging three men on the federal charge of conspiracy to commit wire fraud in connection with a scheme to allegedly sell purported COVID-19 vaccines. The criminal complaint was filed on February 9, 2021 and was unsealed today upon the defendants’ arrests. Charged in the criminal complaint are: Olakitan Oluwalade (“Olaki”), age 22, of Windsor Mill, Maryland; Olaki’s cousin, Odunayo Baba Oluwalade (“Baba”), age 25, of Windsor Mill; and Kelly Lamont Williams, age 22, of Owings Mills, Maryland.