Former Virginia delegate fraudulently obtained $83,000 in COVID relief funds

RICHMOND, Va. (WRIC) -- A now-former Virginia delegate fraudulently obtained around $83,000 in COVID-19 relief funds, according to court documents.

On Thursday, Oct. 30, 34-year-old Ibraheem Samirah was sentenced to three years of probation and ordered to pay nearly $89,000 in restitution after he committed wire fraud while representing parts of Loudoun and Fairfax counties in the Virginia House of Delegates.

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Congress made government-guaranteed loans available for qualifying small businesses and business owners through the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP).

The proceeds for PPP loans were only meant to be allocated to fund specific business-related expenses like payroll costs, rent payments and utility payments, among others.

The PPP allowed interests and principals on the PPP loans to be completely forgiven if the business spent loan proceeds on the above expense items within a designated period of time and used a certain percentage of the PPP loan proceeds on payroll expenses.

Small businesses that applied for PPP loans could do so through private lenders, including financial institutions such as Sonabank, that had been approved to participate in the program by the SBA.

According to court records, Samirah devised and participated in "a scheme to defraud Sonabank and the SBA [Small Business Association,]" through which he obtained money and property from them through fraudulent means. This included materially false pretenses and representations about NHS, as well as fake IRS tax and payroll documents.

In May 2020, then-delegate Samirah applied for a loan on behalf of a business titled Nova Healthy Smile (NHS), which was addressed to Samirah's residential address at the time.

Around May 12, 2020, Samirah was approved for a PPP loan of $83,000 from Sonabank for NHS.

To support the loan, Samirah submitted a Borrower Application Form. On the form, he listed himself as the primary contact and falsely stated that the NHS had four employees and an average monthly payroll of $33,333.32. He claimed that the loan was for payroll, lease/mortgage interest and utilities, according to court documents.

Samirah then later stated that all supporting documents were accurate and true in "all material respects."

In addition to these fraudulent applications, Samirah also submitted several other supporting documents with the PPP loan application, including W-4 forms, payroll journals and paycheck payroll reports for January and February of 2020, just before the PPP cut-off.

Court documents state that Samirah "falsely represented that NHS paid four employees’ payroll in January 2020 and February 2020, when in truth and fact, NHS did not run payroll journals for those periods until May 2020."

"None of the four purported employees received funds from NHS prior to May 2020," court documents state.

Samirah, per the terms of a plea agreement, pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud in July.