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Press Release

Baltimore Man Sentenced to Over Four Years in Federal Prison for Submitting Over $660,000 in Fraudulent Cares Act Loan Applications, a Wire Fraud Conspiracy And Aggravated Identity Theft

For Immediate Release
U.S. Attorney's Office, District of Maryland

Baltimore, Maryland – U.S. District Judge Deborah K. Chasanow sentenced Robert Hopkins IV, age 37, of Baltimore, Maryland to 51 months in federal prison, followed by 3 years of supervised release, for wire fraud conspiracy and aggravated identity theft charges relating to multiple identity theft and fraud schemes, including the submission of fraudulent CARES Act loan applications.  Judge Chasanow also ordered Hopkins to pay $456,784.54 in restitution.   

The sentence was announced by United States Attorney for the District of Maryland Erek L. Barron Special Agent in Charge Bo Keane of the United States Secret Service - Baltimore Field Office and Chief Melissa R. Hyatt of the Baltimore County Police Department. 

According to his guilty plea, from May 2018 to June 2020, Hopkins and co-conspirator Keon Ball, age 46, of Baltimore, Maryland incurred charges of over $1,000,000 on fraudulently established credit lines, using the identities of multiple victims in connection with the schemes.  For example, on August 25, 2018, Ball submitted a false and fraudulent application for a credit line account from a financial institution using the name, birth date, and social security number of Victim 1.  After the credit application was approved, Hopkins and Ball incurred $105,442.59 in purchases from Company 1 (a home improvement store) under the identity of Victim 1.  The defendants then repeated the scheme multiple times, incurring charges of over $150,000 in connection with lines of credit opened using various other victims’ names.  The charges were never repaid.  The defendants also repeatedly passed fraudulent checks to Company 1 purporting to pay the balances they incurred.  Further, as part of their scheme to defraud, the defendants obtained two vehicles valued at over $60,000 and multiple pieces of heavy construction equipment valued at over $300,000 using the identity information of Victim 2.

Additionally, from June 2020 to August 2020, Hopkins applied for $664,450 in fraudulent CARES Act Paycheck Protection Program loan applications for four shell companies he created that did not exist in any legitimate capacity.  In connection to these applications, Hopkins submitted fraudulent tax documents which falsely indicated that the shell companies had paid wages to numerous W-2 employees and withheld hundreds of thousands of dollars in federal income tax.  In fact, the purported businesses had no employees.  The loans were never distributed to Hopkins.

In total, Hopkins and Ball caused more than $449,000 in actual losses and used the personal identity information of at least six victims in connection with their scheme.  Hopkins intended to cause a loss of more than $1,100,000 to victims.

Co-defendant Keon Ball was sentenced to 66 months in federal prison followed by 3 years of supervised release for wire fraud conspiracy and aggravated identity theft in relation to the multiple schemes in July 2022.  The Court also ordered Ball to pay $715,504 in restitution. 

The District of Maryland Strike Force is one of three strike forces established throughout the United States by the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate and prosecute COVID-19 fraud, including fraud relating to the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (“CARES”) Act.  The CARES Act was designed to provide emergency financial assistance to Americans suffering the economic effects caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.  The strike forces focus on large-scale, multi-state pandemic relief fraud perpetrated by criminal organizations and transnational actors.  The strike forces are interagency law enforcement efforts, using prosecutor-led and data analyst-driven teams designed to identify and bring to justice those who stole pandemic relief funds. 

For more information on the Department’s response to the pandemic, please visit https://www.justice.gov/coronavirus.  Anyone with information about allegations of attempted fraud involving COVID-19 can report it by calling the Department of Justice’s National Center for Disaster Fraud (NCDF) Hotline at 866-720-5721 or via the NCDF Web Complaint Form at: https://www.justice.gov/disaster-fraud/ncdf-disaster-complaint-form.

United States Attorney Erek L. Barron commended the USSS and the BCPD for their work in the investigation.  Mr. Barron thanked Assistant U.S. Attorney Paul A. Riley, who prosecuted the case.

For more information on the Maryland U.S. Attorney’s Office, its priorities, and resources available to help the community, please visit https://www.justice.gov/usao-md/community-outreach.

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Contact

Alexis Abbott
(301) 444-4433

Updated September 21, 2022

Topics
Coronavirus
Financial Fraud