BRAZORIA COUNTY, Texas (KTRK) — A Brazoria County girl has admitted to defrauding the federal authorities out of tens of hundreds of {dollars} by posing as a California catastrophe sufferer and submitting false claims for pandemic unemployment advantages.
Joyce Turner, 57, of Rosharon, pleaded responsible Monday in California to catastrophe advantages fraud and mail fraud. Courtroom information present the plea settlement had been within the works for a number of months. Turner stays free on bond whereas awaiting sentencing.
Prosecutors say Turner took benefit of the devastation attributable to the Eaton Fireplace in California this previous January. Simply two days after the blaze was declared a federal catastrophe, Turner submitted a FEMA utility claiming a Los Angeles County rental property she by no means lived in had been broken. FEMA paid her greater than $28,000 earlier than the declare might be verified.
In response to prosecutors, Turner’s fraudulent exercise has been ongoing for many years. She had beforehand filed 10 false claims for federal assist, together with one related to Hurricane Katrina greater than 20 years in the past, a federal prosecutor stated in March.
Her plea deal additionally covers a separate scheme in 2020, when she admitted to gathering greater than $54,000 in unemployment advantages through the COVID-19 pandemic.
In whole, Turner obtained greater than $82,000 in fraudulent funds over a five-year interval.
“These reduction funds are taxpayer {dollars} and are supposed to go to these in actual want,” Jose Gonzalez of the IRS stated in March.
Turner faces as much as 50 years in federal jail when she is sentenced in January.
On-line information present Turner has a prolonged felony historical past in Texas, underneath a number of aliases, that additionally consists of fraud and theft.
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