MIAMI – A former sergeant with the Miami-Dade Corrections and Rehabilitation Department (MDCRD), was sentenced on Friday to 18 months in prison for COVID-19 relief fraud and will also have to pay more than $432,000 in restitution.
Arashio Harris, 49, previously pleaded guilty over charges that he submitted fraudulent applications for two Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans, two Economic Injury Disaster Loans (EIDL) and an EIDL advance.
Recommended Videos
In addition to his position as an MDCRD sergeant, he is also the owner and president of The Good Family Property Solutions Inc. (“Good Family”), of Miami, which still has an active listing on www.sunbiz.org and The Flying Lions LLC (“Flying Lions”), which also has an active listing on www.sunbiz.org.
According to prosecutors, Harris, with the help of an associate, submitted to the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) a false and fraudulent EIDL application in the name of Good Family, seeking both an EIDL and an EIDL advance.
As a result of this fraudulent application, Good Family received a $9,000 EIDL advance that did not need to be repaid and $14,500 in EIDL loan proceeds from SBA.
Harris also submitted a false and fraudulent EIDL application to the SBA for The Flying Lions grossly overstating the company’s gross revenues and number of employees, allowing him to fraudulently obtain $150,000 in EIDL proceeds from the SBA, according to court documents.
Harris continued his fraud scheme by getting two PPP loans in the name of Good Family. In July 2020, Harris submitted a PPP loan application exaggerating Good Family’s payroll.
In support of this fraudulent application, Harris submitted several fake and fabricated 2019 IRS documents claiming that Good Family had a total income of over $1,000,000 and had paid wages and salaries that year of over $768,000.
The documents included false IRS Form W-2s and Good Family payroll records for these “supposed” employees. Harris obtained a $129,275 PPP loan from an SBA-approved PPP lender.
In February 2021, Harris then tried to get another PPP loan for Good Family to take advantage of the additional PPP relief being offered to businesses that had suffered revenue losses in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Again, that application relied on the fraudulent income and payroll numbers used to obtain the first PPP loan, and the application package included fraudulent 2019 IRS forms and fabricated Good Family payroll records for those “supposed employees.” His Good Family company obtained a Second Draw PPP loan of $129,276 from a different SBA-approved PPP lender, according to prosecutors.
Harris was sentenced on Friday, Oct. 27. Upon the completion of his 18-month sentence, he’ll be on supervised release for three years.