© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: Social media influencer Danielle Miller seems in a reserving {photograph} after being arrested by the Sarasota County Sheriff’s Workplace in Sarasota, Florida, U.S. in 2020. Sarasota County Sheriff’s Workplace/Handout through REUTERS. By Nate Raymond
BOSTON (Reuters) – A social media influencer and self-proclaimed con artist pleaded responsible on Monday to fraudulently acquiring greater than $1 million in COVID-19 pandemic-related loans from the U.S. authorities that she used to bankroll a lavish way of life that she flaunted on Instagram.
Danielle Miller, whose scams on this and different instances had been chronicled in a New York Journal profile final yr, appeared earlier than a federal decide in Boston by video from a jail cell to plead responsible to wire fraud and aggravated determine theft expenses.
As part of a plea take care of prosecutors, the 33-year-old agreed to forfeit $1.3 million and serve six years in jail, 16 months of which can overlap with a five-year sentence she obtained in October in a separate Florida financial institution fraud case. Her sentencing was set for June 27.
Prosecutors stated Miller used the identities of greater than 10 individuals to fraudulently arrange financial institution accounts and acquire greater than $1 million in pandemic-related loans supposed for small companies. She used the cash for journey and luxurious purchases resembling a Rolex, a Louis Vuitton bag and Dior sneakers, and posted images on Instagram of herself at luxurious lodges in California the place she used a checking account within the title of considered one of her victims.
Initially from New York, Miller is the daughter of a former New York State Bar Affiliation president and a graduate of the distinguished Horace Mann Faculty. She was already going through expenses within the separate Florida state courtroom fraud case when she was arrested in Might 2021 at a luxurious condominium in Miami, the place she had moved through the pandemic.
“Truthfully, I extra so think about myself a con artist than something,” Miller was quoted as saying within the New York Journal article.
The case is an instance of fraud that turned rampant because the federal authorities rushed to distribute greater than $5 trillion in reduction funds to assist individuals, companies and native governments affected by the pandemic.
Greater than 1,000 individuals have been convicted of defrauding COVID-19 reduction packages, the U.S. Authorities Accountability Workplace stated final month. The White Home final week stated President Joe Biden plans to ask Congress to supply $1.6 billion in new funding to crack down on fraud tied to the packages.
