United States Lawyer Ronald C. Gathe, Jr. introduced that U.S. District Choose Brian A. Jackson sentenced Elliott Sterling, age 34, of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, to 132 months in federal jail following his convictions for wire fraud, monetary assist fraud, and interesting in financial transactions involving property derived from specified illegal exercise. The Court docket additional sentenced Sterling to serve three years of supervised launch following his time period of imprisonment and ordered him to pay restitution within the quantities of $2,760,422 to the U.S. Division of Schooling and $90,000 to the Small Enterprise Administration.
After an eight-day trial, the jury unanimously convicted Sterling of 5 counts of wire fraud involving a scheme to defraud the Division of Schooling federal pupil assist program, two counts of economic assist fraud, and two counts of wire fraud involving the Small Enterprise Administration Financial Harm Catastrophe Mortgage program, which was designed to assist companies throughout the Covid-19 pandemic. Sterling was additionally convicted of six counts of cash laundering involving the proceeds of his two wire fraud schemes. The jury additional ordered the forfeiture of $422,632.38 in fraud proceeds that the FBI had seized within the case.
Because the proof at trial demonstrated, with respect to the Division of Schooling wire fraud and monetary assist fraud counts, Sterling acquired $1,468,239 in federal pupil assist loans and grants that had been related to 180 Baton Rouge Group Faculty (BRCC) college students into his private checking account and the enterprise checking account of his firm, Sterling Instructional Consulting, LLC. The proof offered at trial confirmed that Sterling used the private figuring out info of his purported college students to electronically fill out and submit their Free Functions for Federal Pupil Support (FAFSAs), signal grasp promissory notes on their behalf, enroll them into courses at BRCC, and create and handle the coed BankMobile accounts that acquired federal pupil loans. By means of Sterling’s management of the scholars’ accounts, he directed Division of Schooling monies to be paid immediately into his personal financial institution accounts.
In an effort to circumvent Division of Schooling controls designed to tell college students in regards to the monetary obligations of pupil loans, Sterling hid his position because the preparer of the FAFSAs and pretended to be the scholars when he logged on with their credentials, clicked via the mortgage counseling in lower than three minutes, and signed promissory notes of their names. Usually, the scholars didn’t have entry to the e-mail addresses or login info that Sterling created on their behalf and didn’t have entry to their very own FAFSA, BRCC, or BankMobile accounts.
As well as, Sterling falsified the educational {qualifications} for 168 college students to the Division of Schooling, and 145 of those college students lacked even a highschool diploma or equal (e.g. a GED). A witness at trial additionally testified that Sterling had paid him $5,000 to provide 42 diplomas with fictional grades. These diplomas had been then supplied to BRCC after BRCC requested verification of the scholars’ educational credentials. Not one of the 180 college students for whom Sterling acquired cash progressed academically at BRCC, and 172 failed or withdrew from each class they had been enrolled in. Some college students had been incarcerated when their FAFSAs had been submitted, promissory notes signed, or federal pupil assist disbursed into Sterling’s financial institution accounts.
As a substitute of directing the funds he acquired to the scholars, Sterling stored over 60% for himself, and for 25 college students, Sterling stored 100% of the mortgage proceeds. Among the many college students who acquired cash from Sterling’s scheme, most had been unaware they’d signed up for pupil loans and that Sterling had signed grasp promissory notes of their names obligating them to repay the total quantity. The scholars had been additionally unaware of the true quantity of refunds awarded of their names, and the true quantity Sterling retained as his portion.
With respect to the SBA wire fraud, Sterling submitted a mortgage software on behalf of his enterprise, Sterling Instructional Consulting, LLC, that falsified the enterprise’s revenues and prices and hid his prior responsible plea to felony theft. On account of these false statements, the SBA loaned Sterling $90,000 to ensure that him to pay the working prices of his enterprise throughout the Covid-19 pandemic. Sterling promptly withdrew $75,000 in money. Through the course of his schemes, Sterling additionally spent greater than $253,000 at casinos in Louisiana, Nevada, and Pennsylvania.
Louisiana Inspector Basic Stephen Avenue commented, “Elliott Sterling put quite a lot of effort and time into his calculated scheme to steal hundreds of thousands of economic assist {dollars} from the U.S. Authorities and the taxpayers. He shamelessly broke the legislation out of pure private greed. We had been very happy when a legal jury discovered Sterling responsible on all charged counts, and much more so with the 11-year jail sentence imposed by the Court docket. This vital jail sentence was totally applicable given the brazen nature of the fraud and can hopefully ship a powerful message of zero tolerance. The Louisiana Inspector Basic stays dedicated to rooting out this corruption wherever it could be discovered.” Avenue added, “I need to thank United States Lawyer Ron Gathe and his workers for his or her standard excellent work, in addition to our companions on the FBI and the US Division of Schooling OIG for an additional profitable final result.”
This case was investigated by the FBI, the Louisiana Workplace of Inspector Basic, and the U.S. Division of Schooling – Workplace of Inspector Basic. This case was prosecuted by Deputy Felony Chief Elizabeth E. White and Asset Forfeiture Chief Brad Casey.
