Jefferson City Man, Woman Indicted for $100,000 Student Loan Fraud

 

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. – Tammy Dickinson, United States Attorney for the Western District of Missouri, announced that a Jefferson City, Mo., man and woman were indicted by a federal grand jury today for engaging in a bank fraud scheme in which they unlawfully received more than $100,000 in student loans under another person’s name.

Lisa Kay Baker, 52, and David Waymon Baker, 56, both of Jefferson City, were charged in an 11-count indictment returned by a federal grand jury in Jefferson City. Although Lisa and David Baker were married to each other at the time of the alleged criminal scheme, they divorced in 2009.

Today’s indictment alleges that Lisa and David Baker applied for student loans in the name of another person (identified in the indictment as “RLB”) without that person’s knowledge or consent from July 2005 to September 2007. In each application submitted, the indictment says, the applications were filled out by at least one or both of the defendants, and then one or the other (or a third person at their direction) would forge the signature of “RLB.”

In these loan applications, according to the indictment, Lisa Baker and David Baker, pretending to be “RLB,” concealed the fact that they were actually getting use of the money themselves and that “RLB” had no knowledge of the loan applications and did not authorize the applications to be made.

Fraudulent loan applications were submitted to Sallie Mae Loan Processing, the indictment says, which would then assign the loans to Sallie Mae Bank and The First National Bank of Sioux Falls (S.D.).

Lisa and David Baker are each charged in 11 counts of bank fraud for a series of 11 fraudulent loans, ranging from $6,500 to $19,200, totaling $109,000.

Dickinson cautioned that the charges contained in this indictment are simply accusations, and not evidence of guilt. Evidence supporting the charges must be presented to a federal trial jury, whose duty is to determine guilt or innocence.

This case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Anthony P. Gonzalez. It was investigated by the FBI, the Cole County, Mo., Sheriff’s Department and the Jefferson City, Mo., Police Department.