A former Miami-Dade police officer has been hit with a 4-month prison sentence for committing loan fraud. Samuel Harris, 43, was also ordered on December 11 to remain under supervised release for three years, including four months of home detention, after serving his time behind bars.
The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida stated Harris pleaded guilty to wire fraud related to deceptive applications for financial aid. This comes during a time when economic assistance programs, like the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) and the Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL), were intended to cushion businesses blindsided by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Harris, who was a full-time officer with the Miami-Dade Police Department and simultaneously president of Oregen Digital, Inc., admitted to submitting a fraudulent PPP loan application. He falsely claimed his company had 10 employees and a hefty monthly payroll, netting over $125,000 in PPP loans from an SBA-approved lender in Georgia.
Additionally, the former officer snagged a $10,000 EIDL advance, which did not need to be paid back, and another $149,900 in EIDL loan proceeds, according to authorities. All told, Harris is responsible for repaying $285,479 in restitution, ordered by Senior U.S. District Judge Robert N. Scola Jr., according to the NBC-2 report.
These fraudulent acts were uncovered by the FBI’s Miami Area Corruption Task Force, which features officers from the MDPD and IRS-CI in collaboration with the SBA OIG. Harris’s case highlights the ongoing efforts to combat pandemic-related fraud as part of the DOJ’s COVID-19 Fraud Enforcement Task Force, aimed at bolstering the nation’s response to pandemic-related financial crimes.
