A Los Angeles County man has been sentenced to 41 months in federal prison for fraudulently obtaining a $650,600 Paycheck Protection Program loan under a program intended by Congress to help small businesses survive the COVID-19 pandemic, prosecutors announced.
Andranik Amiryan, 42, was sentenced Sept. 23 by U.S. District Judge Dolly M. Gee, who also ordered him to pay $650,600 in restitution. Amiryan pleaded guilty in April to one count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud.
Gee described as “despicable” Amiryan’s theft of funds provided by the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act, the U.S. Department of Justice said.
Amiryan opened a bank account by using a stolen identity, then, posing as the identity theft victim, falsely told the bank that he was the CEO of ACBA Technologies Inc., a software company. In fact, ACBA existed only as a corporate shell.
Amiryan’s co-conspirators arranged to wire into that account $650,600 of CARES Act relief funds by falsely claiming that ACBA Technologies had a monthly payroll of more than $500,000 and attaching forged tax forms as support.
Once the money was in his account, Amiryan wrote checks to his co-conspirators and to other shell companies he controlled, effectively withdrawing about $452,287 of the funds before the bank froze the account.
Amiryan has been in federal custody since his arrest in September last year. At the time of his arrest, authorities seized $11,800 in cash found in his jacket, and soon afterward seized more than $262,000 from bank accounts he controlled.
As part of his guilty plea, Amiryan agreed to forfeit those assets, which are worth nearly $275,000, according to the DOJ.
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