United States v. Josef Ludwig Brown

Case summary

A grand jury in the Western District of Virginia, Abingdon Division, indicted Josef Ludwig Brown on May 21, 2024 (No. 1:24-cr-00017) with sixteen co-defendants including Crystal Samantha Shaw and Jonathan Scott Webb under 18 U.S.C. § 371, 18 U.S.C. § 1040(a) and 18 U.S.C. § 1349; the indictment alleges that beginning in March 2020, while Brown was incarcerated, Brown, Webb and Shaw devised a scheme to file fraudulent pandemic unemployment claims through the Virginia Employment Commission website using identities passed on by inmates and by friends and acquaintances, with weekly recertifications. Shaw signed a plea agreement filed September 26, 2024, and a March 12, 2025 memorandum opinion by Judge Robert S. Ballou addressed co-defendant Russell Eric Stiltner's appearance bond. On August 1, 2025 Judge Ballou entered judgment against Brown on his guilty plea to Count 1, conspiracy to defraud the United States: 35 months' imprisonment consecutive to any existing state sentence, 3 years' supervised release and restitution of $119,660.00; judgments for Shaw and an amended judgment for Webb were entered the same day. Those August 1, 2025 judgments are the latest filings on the docket.