One woman being prosecuted in Atlanta for defrauding the Paycheck Protection Program is a Walmart bakery worker. Authorities say she helped a cousin apply for pandemic bailout loans in a multi-state scheme involving phony businesses.
Another defendant runs a trucking company and, according to his indictment, hired a financial adviser who helped him and at least four other business owners obtain $300,000 in pandemic loans using falsified documents and inflated employee numbers.
Also accused is a Roswell limousine service proprietor said to have masterminded an $11.1 million scheme involving 21 other defendants and 14 companies, none of which had any actual employees. He allegedly used loan proceeds to treat himself to a Mercedes-Benz, an Acura NSX sports car, a Range Rover and a gold Rolex.
In all three cases, court records show, borrowers relied on New Jersey-based Cross River Bank to approve many of their bogus applications. Cross River, along with financial technology firms that automate lending, processed hundreds of thousands of forgivable business relief loans.
