A Detroit CPA has felt the full weight of justice come down after a monumental scheme defrauding the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) was brought to light. Matthew Lloyd Parker, 37, will spend two years behind bars and has been hit with a $14.5 million restitution bill for his role in a conspiracy that bamboozled lenders through falsified PPP loan applications during the COVID-19 pandemic. This case, prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Gregory C. Melucci, represents the largest known PPP fraud in the Western District of Pennsylvania, according to an announcement on Wednesday from Acting United States Attorney Troy Rivetti.
U.S. District Judge W. Scott Hardy handed down the sentence, which includes not only prison time but also a stretch of four years of supervised release. The scheme, which ran from March 2020 to August 2021, saw Parker employing his skills as a licensed CPA to falsely inflate loan applications for hundreds of small businesses in both Pittsburgh and Detroit. He managed to quickly and falsely generate substantial PPP loans which led to more than 200 applications being wrongfully approved by the Small Business Administration, totaling about $14.5 million, as per details provided by the U.S. Attorney's Office.
The investigation into Parker's fraudulent activities was led by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, along with the United States Postal Inspection Service. Acting U.S. Attorney Rivetti commended both agencies for their diligence in uncovering the scheme. “Parker’s sophistication as a CPA aided him in falsifying the hundreds of PPP loan documents, which then generated substantial PPP loans to others along with approximately $1.5 million dollars in loan processing fees to Parker," Rivetti conveyed in a detailed expose presented in court, as reported by the U.S. Attorney's Office.
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