Three individuals formerly from the St. Louis area have come forward this Tuesday admitting to a sizable grift, totaling approximately $229,000, all fraudulently claimed from federal loan programs that were set to aid small businesses during the throes of the COVID-19 pandemic. The trio, identified as Brianna L. Bell-Maple, 24, Jemyla A. Bell, 39, and Leiah A. Vaughn, 23, each faced the music at the U.S. District Court in St. Louis, conceding to one count of wire fraud, according to a statement from the U.S. Attorney's Office.
Their elaborate scheme involved filing applications for a dozen Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans from March to August in 2021, each application was nearly a carbon copy of the other and they each tried to snag the maximum loan amount of $20,833 for a phantom women’s clothing boutique, giving the false impression the store had churned a profit of $121,003 in 2019 and even had the audacity to back their claims with doctored tax documents. Eleven out of twelve loan applications managed to hoodwink the system and were approved, accumulating a bounty of $229,163—PPP loans being the lifesaver intended for small businesses to stay afloat and keep their employees during the crisis. Bell-Maple fittingly used some of the ill-gotten gains to secure a new lease in April of 2021, which she then shared with Vaughn, the pair and Bell sprinkled the rest of their fraudulent fiscal windfall across personal indulgences, including splurges on shopping dining out, and not forgetting cash handouts to their inner circle.
In one of the more brazen misappropriations, on May 5, Vaughn and Bell-Maple dropped a cool $5,200 on a purebred puppy, then barely letting the ink dry, Bell-Maple teamed up with Bell to each purchase a car from the same dealership two days later. Their disregard for the true purpose of these funds seemed boundless as they even had the temerity to submit loan forgiveness applications on August 9, claiming they had expended the funds on payroll—all approved based on their fictitious assertions.
Now residing comfortably in Fresno, Calif., Bell-Maple, Bell, and Vaughn await their judgment day scheduled for June 9, while they've subsequently conceded to a money judgment equivalent to the total amount they deceitfully obtained, the wire fraud charge itself carries a penalty that could be as severe as 20 years in the clink, a $250,000 fine or possibly both for their unscrupulous actions, the story of their downfall deftly probed and prosecuted by the determined efforts of the FBI and Assistant U.S. Attorney Jonathan Clow, as originally reported by the Justice Department.
