From the Sacramento Bee:
A West Sacramento man is accused of taking part in a scheme that defrauded the Social Security Administration of more than $450,000, according to the U.S. attorney’s office.
A federal grand jury Thursday returned a 13-count indictment against Eric Lemoyne Willis, 42, of West Sacramento, and Darron Dimitri Ross, 33, of Charlotte, North Carolina, said the U.S. attorney’s office in a press release. They have been charged with conspiracy to defraud and commit crimes against the United States, theft of government property, aggravated identity theft and wire fraud.
According to the release, Willis worked as a Social Security Administration operation supervisor in Sacramento and Lodi from 2015 to 2018. During this time, Willis accessed private information of Social Security beneficiaries who used direct deposit for large benefit sums, officials said.
Willis gave this information to Ross in North Carolina, where Ross set up fake bank accounts with the stolen identities, according to the U.S. attorney. Ross then called the Social Security Administration and attempted to transfer benefit deposits from the original bank accounts to the fraudulent accounts he established using the beneficiaries’ private information.
Ah, Operations people, the same group that are trying to absorb ODAR/OHO, eliminate hearing offices, replace SCTs, and turn ALJs into cubicle-worker hearing officers.
ReplyDeleteBravo.
Get your act together, Operations
Interesting that he captured the PII, but rather than do the inputs himself, which could be traced back to his PIN, he sent the info to the confederate who called SSA and managed to change the direct deposit by using the PII and other employees.
ReplyDeleteA little more ingenious than making the changes himself at the office because it would be harder to trace it to him. But so dumb and cocky that he thought SSA could not figure this out. And now facing up to 37 years in prison. I am really curious to see how this case plays out. I know this guy. Not surprised that he played fast and loose, but never thought he'd go to this level.
@749 Operations Supervisor is just what supervisors in field offices are called. They wouldn't be doing anything you stated.
ReplyDeleteOperation supervisors spend a lot of time resolving check issues. So this one had probably years of experience observing the process and acting as if he were clever enough to find a hole in the process that he could use to his advantage. 148 cases for $450000. Now is facing 37 years in prison. I am curious how they figured it out. Did someone notice a pattern and it started an investigation.
ReplyDeleteOperations Supervisors spend a good part of their day solving check problems (where is my money?) and other day to day work of SSA. They also create work schedules, assign work to employees. Funny that 7:49 thinks that an Operations Supervisor spends any time thinking or doing anything about OHO. OHO has their job, but no one there can make a check show up in a bank account. And the bottom line is that every claimant wants a check to show up in their bank account. No one in OHO can take that action. Now this OS obviously has years of experience with checks and direct deposit and incorrectly guessed that he figured out a foolproof method of stealing government checks without his own PIN being attached. He may also have been able to take action after the incorrect direct deposits were done to attempt to hide the incorrect payments. Perhaps that was his undoing. I am sure curious.
ReplyDeleteIn my view, the looming problem is that the hiring process has been degraded so far from the early days, and it is catching up more and more with the agency. The tests maybe are making a slight comeback with aqua, but to my knowledge Outstanding Scholar is completely gone. If you don't want highly intelligent and scrupulous employees, you'd better shore up the security quickly.
ReplyDelete@7:49
ReplyDeleteI'm a manager in OHO and believe me: if the chucklef--- managers all around and above me had access to the $$, they'd be doing and getting caught for this type of thing at a much higher clip.
Say what you will about Operations not appreciating what OHO does and just wanting to move work faster, but their first and second line managers eat our pathetic hearing office management's lunch in terms of competency and diligence.
but sending all of the past due benefits to lawyers is a great idea and nothing like this would ever happen.
ReplyDelete@1:36: By the wording alone, I'm not certain whether you are seriously advocating this change--as have many of us, or whether it was meant in sarcasm. That change would free many hours of work for SSA employees. Although there are a few cases each year of attorneys who have wrongfully pocketed funds belonging to clients (in all areas of practice),it is the most certain way to guarantee that you will lose your license permanently. State Bars are extremely protective of clients whose attorneys may have improperly touched client's money--and such things are usually investigated much more quickly than done by the SSA.
ReplyDeleteSo sad, but like they say "Don't do the crime if you can't do the time "! Everyone gets caught sooner or later.. I know him personally, that's what makes it like "who, what, for real". Showboating will sink you everytime..
ReplyDelete