CHICAGO — A south suburban man was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison Tuesday in a massive, $14 million fraud scheme where he collected kickbacks for filing more than 1,500 bogus loan applications at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The 120-month term handed down to Sharhabeel Shreiteh was believed to be the longest sentence for any case in U.S. District Court in Chicago related to the country’s Paycheck Protection Program, which funded emergency loans designed to give financial relief to small business owners and others during the pandemic but became a hotbed of fraud and abuse.
Shreiteh, 46, buried his face in his hands and wept after U.S. District Judge Martha Pacold announced the sentence, which was at the top of the federal sentencing guidelines and more than three times higher than what the defense requested.
Earlier in the two-hour hearing, Shrieteh, a tax preparer who lives in Crete, apologized to the court and his family “for the harm” he did.
“I don’t know what to say or do now,” Shrieteh said. “It’s so harming for everyone. I’m speechless.”
Pacold acknowledged that her sentence was on the high end, but said she found the level of fraud perpetrated by Shrieteh to be “staggering.”
According to Assistant U.S. Attorney Elie Zenner, Shrieteh submitted more than 1,500 false PPP loan applications on behalf of at least 1,025 clients beginning in 2020, causing some $14 million of funds to be dispersed, most of which was forgiven by the U.S. government.
In return, Shrieteh received about $740,000 in kickbacks from clients, spending it on luxury vacations and expensive home renovations, Zenner wrote in a recent sentencing memo. He also sent hundreds of thousands of dollars to his second wife in his native Palestine, where he built a luxury second home and purchased a Mercedes, according to Zenner.
In July 2021, Shrieteh’s American wife texted him angrily about the expenditures in Palestine, beginning with the line “You suck!” according to the prosecution filing.
“I bust my ass for 13 years and don’t have like she gets without working for it!!!” she wrote, according to the filing. “You gave her kids, a villa, now fancy cars??!! …I’m so sick and tired of being lied to by you!!!”
As the fraud associated with the PPP loans began making national news, Shrieteh acknowledged to an associate that he was being paid big money, saying in one text message, “Mother(expletive) it’s not coffee,” according to prosecutors.
“You gonna put my ass in jail soon,” Shrieteh wrote, according to the prosecution memo. “Most stupid fraud in history.”
Charges against Shrieteh’s co-defendant, Tracy Mitchell, are pending, records show.
Shrieteh is also facing a related tax fraud case before U.S. District Judge John Tharp, according to court records.
_____
First Appeared on
Source link
Leave feedback about this