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Awilda Henriquez, 35, took her chances with a trial after three of her accomplices took guilty pleas.
She was found guilty in U.S. District Court in Camden on Thursday of 27 counts involving defrauding the federal government, mail theft, stealing government money and aggravated ID theft, Acting U.S. Attorney Rachael A. Honig said.
Ring members filed more than 3,300 tax returns in 2013 using the names and Social Security numbers of residents of Puerto Rico, Honig said.
They directed those refund checks that were issued to a small section of the Camden County town of Pennsauken, the U.S. attorney said.
The conspirators bribed mail carriers from the U.S. Postal Service to steal tax refund checks from the mail as part of the scheme, an indictment returned by a federal grand jury in Camden against Henriquez and several co-conspirators alleged.
Henriguez and her partners than recruited “check couriers” to cash the refund checks, the indictment said.
Some using fraudulent identifications – among them, fake New Jersey driver's licenses, bogus Social Security cards and phony Department of Homeland Security Permanent Resident Identification cards – at check-cashing businesses in New Jersey, Philadelphia, and New York, Honig said.
Henriquez, of Clementon, paid tellers at those businesses to participate in the scheme, the U.S. attorney said.
One of the defendants, Alberto Sanchez of Camden, was sentenced to 45 months in federal prison a year ago this Monday after pleading guilty to theft of government funds, aggravated identity theft and witness tampering, Honig said.
Another, Jorge Gutierrez of Merchantville, pleaded guilty this past Oct. 27 to defrauding the United States, she said. He’s scheduled to be sentenced on March 1, 2022.
Roque Bisono of Maple Shade pleaded guilty in November 2018 to conspiracy to defraud the United States, theft of government funds, aggravated identity theft, and false statements. His sentencing is scheduled for March 21, 2022, Honig said.
Senior U.S. District Judge Robert B. Kugler scheduled Henriquez’s sentencing in federal court in Camden for April 12, 2022.
She and the others must serve out just about all of their sentences because they’re no parole in the federal prison system.
Honig credited special agents of the IRS-Criminal Investigation in Newark and Philadelphia, along with special agents of the U.S. Postal Service Office of Inspector General’s Northeast Area Field Office, for the investigation.
She also thanked the U.S. Postal Inspection Service.
Handling the case for the government are Senior Trial Counsel Jason M. Richardson and Assistant U.S. Attorney Christina O. Hud of Honig’s Criminal Division.
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