Gabriela Llerenas, COVID Relief Scam, California 2024

LOS ANGELES – A former California Employment Development Department (EDD) employee is behind bars for her role in a brazen COVID-19 relief scam that left taxpayers on the hook for over $1.6 million in fraudulent benefits.

Gabriela Llerenas, 44, a.k.a. ‘Maria G. Sandoval,’ of Perris, California, pleaded guilty to a single-count information charging her with mail fraud. Llerenas previously worked at EDD as a disability insurance program representative, however, her tenure ended abruptly in 2002 after she admitted to fraudulently authorizing and paying disability benefits.

Her latest scheme took advantage of the expanded eligibility for unemployment insurance (UI) benefits made possible by the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act. From April to October 2020, Llerenas filed and caused the filing of 197 fraudulent unemployment insurance benefits that falsely asserted the named claimants were self-employed independent contractors negatively affected by the pandemic.

Llerenas obtained the names, Social Security numbers, and other identifying information used to submit the fraudulent claims through her prior work as a tax preparer. The EDD employee even went so far as to inflate the amounts of income she reported for the claimants to maximize the benefit amount.

As a result of the fraudulent unemployment benefits applications, EDD authorized Bank of America to mail debit cards in the names of the claimants to addresses provided by Llerenas, including her residence, her husband’s business location, her mother’s apartment, and the addresses of friends and family members.

Llerenas admitted to charging the named claimants a fee for filling the applications, which was often paid out of the fraudulently obtained benefits. In at least one case, she told the claimant that she was still employed at EDD and could control the distribution of the unemployment insurance benefits, then demanded an additional payment for ‘releasing’ the benefits.

The losses to EDD and the United States Treasury from Llerenas’ scheme total at least $1,633,487. Llerenas is scheduled to make her initial appearance on September 22, and faces a statutory maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison.

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