Two Louisiana residents, a former Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office (OPSO) employee, and a Slidell resident, have been indicted for their alleged roles in a conspiracy involving theft and bribery of federal funds, according to a recent announcement by Acting U.S. Attorney Michael M. Simpson. The indictment handed down on Thursday, charges Kenneth Lawson, 39, and Areion Banks, 33, with plotting to divert checks from OPSO to personal accounts and pay bribes.
Lawson, as the grants manager for the OPSO’s Grants Department, held sway over grant payment requests to grant originators and had the means to issue checks to subgrantees. Banks and Lawson connected around March 2024 and soon after, began their scheme, which facilitated Lawson’s interception of about $15,000. In return, Banks paid Lawson a bribe of approximately $5,900, “without authorization, by exploiting Lawson’s position with OPSO,” according to the indictment details. The duo’s tactics also involved a deceptive transaction where Lawson directed the transfer of $100,000 to a business account he controlled, under the guise of a legitimate OPSO-approved transaction.
Kenneth Lawson took measures to conceal this unlawful activity by creating the entity “Williams James Assoc. LLC.” and proceeded to serve as its managing member. He employed this entity to request a drawdown of a $3.907 million grant from the DOJ to a business checking account in the name of Williams James, although the company had no actual ties to OPSO. Acting on instructions from Lawson, Banks falsely posed as an OPSO employee to validate this transaction with the financial institution. “In fact, OPSO was unaware of, and had not approved, the transaction,” clarified the acting U.S. Attorney’s statement, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office…