Archive | fraud

In case you missed it, the Supreme Court recently granted certiorari in Dubin v. United States, No. 22-10, which presents the question whether a person commits aggravated identity theft any time he or she mentions or otherwise recites someone else’s name while committing a predicate offense.

David Dubin was convicted of Medicaid fraud. As the case arrives at the Supreme Court, he is challenging a separate conviction under a federal law (18 U.S.C. § 1028A(a)(1)) that makes it a crime to use another person’s “means of identification” during and in relation to certain other crimes, including healthcare fraud. Federal prosecutors contend that Dubin’s use of his patient’s name on a false Medicaid claim violated the statute, adding an extra two years to his one-year sentence for fraud.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit upheld Dubin’s conviction and sentence, and on rehearing a …

In US v. Dumitru, decided March 22, 2021, an immigration attorney was convicted after trial of asylum fraud, making false statements, and aggravated identity theft. She was sentenced to 60 months. The attorney’s alleged conduct was that she falsely filled out asylum applications on behalf of her clients and also signed and notarized those applications with her clients’ names without showing them the applications or obtaining consent.

The principal issue on appeal was whether the evidence was sufficient to prove identity theft, i.e., did the defendant use a means of identification (here a signature) without lawful authority to aid in the commission of the fraud offense. The Circuit held that the evidence was sufficient.

Signing her clients’ names without permission, and using those forged signatures to represent to the immigration authorities that her clients were requesting government action based on the false information in the applications, sufficed to prove …