A federal grand jury has returned an indictment charging two Maryland men with a scheme to fraudulently obtain more than $1 million in unemployment insurance benefits, the U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of Maryland announced today.
Daiwor Woah-Tee, 51, of Belcamp, and Dekwii Woah-Tee, 46, of Rosedale, are charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and aggravated identity theft, the office said.
According to the indictment, unemployment insurance (UI) is a joint federal and state program that provides temporary financial assistance to eligible individuals unemployed through no fault of their own, the department reported.
Several federal programs, according to the department, including the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance Program (PUA), the Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation (FPUC), and the Lost Wages Assistance Program (LWAP), expanded UI eligibility and benefits in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The department said that from March 2020 to September 2021, the defendants allegedly conspired to commit wire fraud by submitting fraudulent unemployment claims to State Workforce Agencies (SWAs), including the Maryland Department of Labor (MD-DOL), the indictment states.