PebHmong Discussion Forum
General Category => General Discussion => Topic started by: theking on November 19, 2021, 10:28:37 PM
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..as we've seen it here on PH i.e., living under parents' roof and leeching off them. In this case, the parents just abandon their kids ???:
California couple who swindled millions in COVID relief funds cut off their electronic bracelets and fled, leaving their 3 teenage children behind, reports say
A California couple who ran a scheme that stole millions in COVID-19 relief funds cut off their electronic bracelets and fled while waiting for their prison sentences, authorities said on Tuesday.
Richard Ayvazyan, 43, and his wife, Marietta Terabelian, 37, used fake identities — including the names of elderly or deceased people and foreign-exchange students who had left the US — to claim money meant to aid small businesses and people suffering from the pandemic, federal prosecutors said.
Ayvazyan recruited others who have already been sentenced, and together they made about 150 fraudulent loan applications while scheming to take $20 million in funds, prosecutors said.
The couple then used the cash to buy luxury homes in Tarzana, Glendale, and Palm Desert, as well as gold coins, jewelry, luxury watches, designer handbags, and a Harley Davidson motorcycle, among other lavish items, prosecutors said.
The couple and Ayvazyan's brother, Artur, were found guilty on June 25 of wire fraud, bank fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering, and conspiracy to commit bank fraud.
On August 29, the couple fled and left a note for their three teenage children, the Los Angeles Times reported.
"We will be together again one day. This is not a goodbye but a brief break from one another," they wrote.
On Monday, the pair was sentenced in absentia by US District Judge Stephen V. Wilson, who handed Ayvazyan a 17-year sentence and gave Terabelian six years in prison. Artur Ayvazyan was given five years in federal prison.
The couple's children were "visibly distraught" in the courtroom on Monday as they listened to the judge sentence their parents and uncle, the LA Times reported.