Federal charges arising out of a pandemic-era unemployment insurance fraud scheme. The government alleged that claims were filed with state workforce agencies in the names of other individuals and that benefits were drawn on debit cards issued in those names. A 9-count indictment charged the client in 8 of its counts, alongside a co-defendant the government identified as the organizer of the scheme. She had no prior criminal history and had lived without incident for 6 years between the conduct and the sentencing.
The government's position placed the total offense level at 23 and treated the full $5.1 million intended loss of the conspiracy as this client's relevant conduct. Counsel filed 5 written objections to the presentence report, a reply brief, and a demand that the government produce the claim-level basis for its loss figure before the hearing rather than at it. At sentencing, counsel litigated loss attribution under U.S.S.G. § 1B1.3(a)(1)(B), the 10-or-more-victims enhancement under § 2B1.1(b)(2), double counting under § 2B1.1(b)(11), and minor role under § 3B1.2, and cross-examined the federal case agent on the government's exhibits. Counsel negotiated a plea to 2 counts, obtained dismissal of every remaining count charged against the client, and secured self-surrender.
Federal fraud sentencing turns on a question most defendants never hear framed correctly. What a conspiracy caused and what a particular defendant agreed to join are two different questions, and the guidelines invite courts to collapse them. Counsel built the record around the Eleventh Circuit's decision in United States v. Lopez, which holds that a defendant's awareness of a larger scheme is not by itself enough to make the entire scheme her relevant conduct, and forced the government to prove the scope of her agreement rather than the size of the fraud. The court attributed the full loss figure, but the argument did its work at the next stage. In imposing sentence, the court found that this client's full contemplation of the scheme's scope had not been established, and that finding drove the variance. Counsel paired it with a mitigation record built on 6 years of law-abiding conduct after the offense, the client's care for an autistic teenage son she homeschools and for her elderly father, her continuing mental health treatment, and letters from her community. The court varied 22 months below the bottom of the guideline range, recommended drug treatment programming and a designation near her family, and allowed her to remain free and report to the Bureau of Prisons.
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