The Atlanta Bureau of the US Secret Service pulling out the stops, capturing fraudsters and recovering millions in PPP loan theft and employment benefit money.
ATLANTA — When COVID-19 hit, jobs tanked, small businesses collapsed, families suffered, and millions of paychecks disappeared.
As dollars started flowing out in COVID related Paycheck Protection loans (PPP), and unemployment benefits to rescue struggling businesses and help those who lost jobs, millions of dollars ended up the hands of fraudsters and scammers.
At the forefront of hunting them down is the Atlanta bureau of the U.S. Secret Service, charged with protecting the nation’s financial system.
“This type of fraud is a very high priority for our Agency and in our office we have approximately 15 to 20 agents investigating this on a full time basis, then we can tap into an additional 20 to 30 agents when needed,” Special Agent Steven Baisel, who heads the Atlanta bureau, said.
Yet, the big question is how did all of this financial fraud gain momentum?
According to the Secret Service, it was electronic filing.
“Electronic cyberspace is the key as to how fast fraud has been able to take off,” Baisel said, adding that the priority was getting the money out quickly to those in need.
“The programs were not set…
