July 19, 2025 – Jaime Ornelas, 27, formerly of Modesto, was sentenced on Friday by U.S. District Judge Dena Coggins to three
years and one month in prison and ordered to pay $150,000 in restitution for conspiracy to commit mail fraud arising from fraudulently submitted unemployment insurance benefits, Acting U.S. Attorney Kimberly A. Sanchez announced.
On June 6, 2025, Jaime Ornelas’s mother and co-defendant Misty Ornelas, 48, of Turlock, was sentenced to 18 months in prison.
According to court documents, beginning in June 2020, Jaime Ornelas and Misty Ornelas operated a scheme to submit fraudulent unemployment insurance benefit claims to the California Employment Development Department (EDD). Jaime Ornelas, who was then-incarcerated at the High Desert State Prison in Lassen County, provided Misty Ornelas personally identifiable information of fellow inmates. Misty Ornelas then used that information to submit fraudulent unemployment insurance benefit applications to EDD. The submitted applications misrepresented the eligibility of the inmates, including that they had last worked within the prior few months and had become unemployed because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The fraudulent claims were worth more than $150,000…