Hudson Man Pleads Guilty to Fraudulently Obtaining COVID-19 Relief Funds

CONCORD – A Hudson man pleaded guilty today in federal court to fraudulently submitting four loan applications to obtain CARES Act funds, U.S. Attorney Jane E. Young announces.

Matthew Dispensa, 57, pleaded guilty to three counts of bank fraud and one count of attempted wire fraud. U.S. District Court Judge Joseph N. Laplante scheduled sentencing for May 28, 2024.  Dispensa was charged on April 26, 2023.

Dispensa fraudulently applied for multiple loans under the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) and Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL) programs. For example, on May 5, 2020, the defendant applied for a $90,400 PPP loan from Primary Bank for an entity called Gateway Hills LLC.  In connection with the application, the defendant provided the bank multiple false supporting documents, such as fake annual and quarterly tax documents and a “Management Report” for the period ending December 31, 2020, seven months into the future.  The defendant also provided a “Payroll Summary” showing that he was paid $8,700 per month through Gateway Hills LLC.  The defendant’s tax returns actually showed no income from that entity.

Similarly, on December 29, 2020, the defendant applied for a $150,000 EIDL from the Small Business Administration.  In that application, the defendant falsely claimed that the Gateway Hills LLC entity had gross revenues of $485,000 in the 12 months preceding January 31, 2020.  However, the bank records showed no actual regular business activity for Gateway Hills LLC.

Overall, the defendant fraudulently obtained $342,650 and attempted to fraudulently obtain $492,650.

The charge of bank fraud provides a sentence of no greater than 30 years in prison, 5 years of supervised release, and a fine of $1 million.  The charge of attempted wire fraud provides a sentence of no more than 20 years in prison, 3 years of supervised release, and a fine of $250,000 or twice the gross gain or loss, whichever is greater.  Sentences are imposed by a federal district court judge based upon the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and statutes which govern the determination of a sentence in a criminal case.

The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration and U.S. Postal Inspection Service led the investigation. Valuable assistance was provided by the Hudson Police Department. Assistant U.S. Attorney Alexander S. Chen is prosecuting the case.

During the early part of the coronavirus pandemic, Congress passed the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act.  The CARES Act included multiple relief provisions to help the millions of Americans and many small businesses adversely affected by the pandemic, including the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP).  Private lenders could participate in the PPP.  The loans, which were supposed to be used for payroll, were fully guaranteed by the government.  If borrowers used the PPP loans for payroll and other approved expenses as intended, they could apply for loan forgiveness.  The CARES Act also opened up the Small Business Administration’s (SBA) Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL) program.  As with PPP loans, EIDL loans were supposed to be used for payroll and other business expenses such as rent and mortgage.

On May 17, 2021, the Attorney General established the COVID-19 Fraud Enforcement Task Force to marshal the resources of the Department of Justice in partnership with agencies across government to enhance efforts to combat and prevent pandemic-related fraud. The Task Force bolsters efforts to investigate and prosecute the most culpable domestic and international criminal actors and assists agencies tasked with administering relief programs to prevent fraud by, among other methods, augmenting and incorporating existing coordination mechanisms, identifying resources and techniques to uncover fraudulent actors and their schemes, and sharing and harnessing information and insights gained from prior enforcement efforts. 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.

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