Government's Sentencing Memorandum — Gardy Alexandre

Record facts

U.S. District Court, District of Massachusetts · No. 1:24-cr-10007-MJJ · Doc. 68 · 2024-05-21 · Docket on CourtListener

Summary

The government's sentencing memorandum for defendant Gardy Alexandre in United States v. Alexandre, No. 1:24-cr-10007-MJJ, U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, filed May 21, 2024 as Doc. 68. It asks the Court to impose 27 months of incarceration, 36 months of supervised release and restitution of $1,455,652 as agreed in the Plea Agreement. The memorandum describes the offense conduct as the government states it, involving PPP applications prepared with co-defendants Adiana Pierre and Wallace Ford. It calculates a total offense level of 19 and an advisory range of 33- 41 months, and addresses the 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) factors, including comparison sentences in other cases. It is signed by Assistant U.S. Attorney David M. Holcomb.

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Full text

1 
 
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 
FOR THE DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS 
 
 
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA  
) 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
 
v. 
 
 
 
 
) 
Criminal No. 24-cr-10007-3-MJJ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
GARDY ALEXANDRE, 
 
 
) 
 
 
 
 
 
 
) 
 
 
 
Defendant 
 
) 
 
GOVERNMENT’S SENTENCING MEMORANDUM 
The United States respectfully submits this memorandum regarding the sentencing of the 
defendant, Gardy Alexandre, which is scheduled for May 28, 2024.1   
The defendant pleaded guilty to conspiring to submit fraudulent Paycheck Protection 
Program (“PPP”) applications and engaging in unlawful monetary transactions with proceeds of 
those applications.  For the reasons stated below, the government asks the Court to sentence the 
defendant to 27 months of incarceration and 36 months of supervised release, and to order the 
defendant to pay restitution of $1,455,652 as agreed to in the parties’ Plea Agreement (Dkt. 39). 
OFFENSE CONDUCT 
At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, the defendant worked with others to 
exploit emergency measures that the federal government implemented to keep real businesses 
running and paying real employees.   
 
1 Pursuant to the Court’s Procedural Order Re: Sentencing (Dkt. 57), the government 
respectfully reports (1) that the government is not moving for a departure from the applicable 
guideline range or for a non guideline sentence; (2) that there are no legal questions that have not 
been adequately addressed in the presentence report (“PSR”), in the parties’ objections to the PSR, 
or in the parties’ sentencing memoranda; and (3) that there are no factual issues which the 
government contends would require an evidentiary hearing. 
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The defendant worked alone and had no employees.  However, when PPP funds became 
available in April and May 2020, the defendant applied for a PPP loan for Palm Beach Community 
House (“PBCH”), a non-profit that he registered over a decade prior and that had no activity or 
employees by 2020. 
After his first attempt at obtaining a PPP loan for PBCH failed, the defendant accepted 
assistance from a woman that he met through his work as a tax return preparer, co-defendant 
Adiana Pierre.  Pierre and her friend from church, co-defendant Wallace Ford, agreed to work 
together to make money by securing PPP loans for individuals and businesses.  Pierre recruited 
the borrowers, and Ford electronically prepared the applications.  Rather than soliciting and 
reporting accurate information about potential borrowers’ employees and payroll costs, they 
fabricated the numbers on the applications that Ford prepared.  Ford also prepared fake tax forms 
for borrowers to match the payroll costs he stated on applications.  For securing loans through false 
applications, Ford and Pierre charged borrowers a commission, typically of around 10 percent. 
In early June, Ford prepared two PPP applications for PBCH, which falsely claimed 
employees and payroll expenses in 2019 that PBCH never actually had or paid.  Ford prepared a 
fake 2019 Form W-3 for PBCH to match the pretend payroll expenses.  As a result of one of these 
applications, the defendant received a PPP loan of $300,000 for PBCH.  In return, he paid Ford a 
$30,000 kickback (10 percent of his loan proceeds). 
Thereafter, the defendant agreed to recruit additional borrowers to submit applications 
through Pierre and Ford.  He shared in the kickbacks for securing loans for these borrowers.  
Several of the borrowers that the defendant referred to Pierre and Ford for loans were 
Massachusetts residents connected to the defendant’s cousin.  One—Bill Dessaps—operated a 
used car dealership that employed only a few people but received $836,800 from an application 
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that falsely claimed that the dealership had 40 employees and average monthly payroll expenses 
of $334,720.  Dessaps paid $28,000 to the defendant, who passed $21,000 of that money along to 
Ford.  Another—Wens Mathurin—received $313,852 for a business that did not yet exist, as a 
result of an application that falsely claimed 25 employees and average monthly payroll expenses 
of $125,541.  Mathurin paid $62,760 to the defendant, who sent $30,000 of that amount to Ford.  
The defendant recruited at least five borrowers in 2020, who together received 
approximately $1.5 million in PPP loans through false applications.  The defendant personally 
received $143,760 from these borrowers for helping secure these funds and passed along additional 
amounts from these borrowers to Pierre and Ford. 
SENTENCING GUIDELINES 
The government respectfully submits that the defendant’s total offense level under § 2S1.1 
is 19, calculated as follows:  
Offense level for the underlying offense (wire fraud), § 2S1.1(a)(1) 
• Base offense level for underlying offense (wire fraud), § 2B1.1(a)(1) 
• Loss greater than $550,000 but less than $1,500,000, § 2B1.1(b)(1)(I) 
21 
• 7 
• +14 
The defendant is convicted under 18 U.S.C. § 1957, § 2S1.1(b)(2)(A) 
+1 
Acceptance of responsibility, § 3E1.1 
-3 
Total Offense Level 
19 
At Criminal History Category II, this offense level results in an advisory Guidelines range of 33-
41 months of imprisonment.   
 
The government has outlined its position on the proper base offense level under § 2S1.1 in 
its objection to the PSR.  The government’s position adheres to the text of that guideline, which 
takes as its base offense level “the offense level for the underlying offense from which the 
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laundered funds were derived.”  Wire fraud is the underlying offense; the offense level for wire 
fraud is calculated under § 2B1.1; and, for purposes of determining the base offense level of wire 
fraud under § 2B1.1, wire fraud is referenced to that guideline.  The “offense level for the 
underlying [wire fraud]” therefore starts with a base level of 7, not 6.  This position is consistent 
with the Sentencing Commission’s guidance, the stated goal of the money laundering guideline, 
and appellate authority, including United States v. Cruzado-Laureano, 440 F.3d 344, 48 (1st Cir. 
2006) (looking to the offense level of the underlying extortion offense “standing alone” as the 
starting place for its analysis under § 2S1.1).  Where plain text, purpose, and precedent align on 
this position, the rule of lenity has no application. 
SECTION 3553(a) FACTORS 
The sentencing factors set forth in 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) support the 27-month incarcerative 
sentence the government is requesting.  This below-guidelines sentence accounts for the 
defendant’s pre-indictment acceptance of responsibility, his background, and his relative role in 
the scheme and the resulting losses. 
Nature and Circumstances of the Offense  
During a nationwide rush to disburse PPP funds to small businesses and employees who 
needed the money, the defendant and his co-conspirators profited from the program by stealing for 
themselves and for others.  
By design, the program relied on borrowers’ representations about their businesses on a 
short form application.  Calculating the loan amount was straightforward; borrowers generally 
qualified to receive a loan of 2.5 times their average monthly payroll expenses.  The process was 
quick and simple by design and relied on borrowers’ certifications to having provided truthful and 
accurate information about their businesses. 
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The defendant took advantage of the national emergency and lied to get $300,000 for a 
non-existent business.  It matters little that the defendant relied on someone else to prepare the 
application and to falsify supporting documents.  He ultimately signed the application and accepted 
the windfall.  By stealing from a limited pool of money, which ultimately was exhausted, he 
harmed not only the government, but also from real small businesses that truly needed those loans 
and from those businesses’ employees.  
Had the defendant’s conduct stopped there, his case might be within the heartland of PPP 
fraud committed during this period.  But the defendant took additional amounts from the program 
by bringing other borrowers into the scheme and then taking a cut of their PPP funds.  This kind 
of disaster profiteering is reprehensible and merits a sentence that recognizes its harm to the public. 
History and Characteristics of the Defendant 
 
The PSR and the defendant’s memorandum describe numerous challenges that the 
defendant faced in childhood and into adulthood, including displacement, abuse, relationship 
instability, behavioral health issues, and encounters with the criminal justice system, several of 
which resulted from substance use.  He has several children and is active in their lives to varying 
degrees.  As a non-citizen, the defendant likely is subject to removal as a result of this case.2 
These hardships should be weighed alongside the defendant’s occupation and its 
implications for the offense he committed.  Professionally, the defendant reported to the Probation 
Office that he worked over the last decade as a self-employed tax return preparer and consultant 
and that he made a comfortable salary from this work.  The defendant must have understood how 
amounts reported on forms result in real world consequences, just as he must have appreciated the 
 
2 The government is not aware of any reason that the defendant could not have obtained 
citizenship during his lengthy residence in the United States, and the PSR suggests that he began 
an application in the 1990s but abandoned it. 
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significance of lying on financial documents.  The defendant did not exploit the PPP out of 
hardship, impulse, or confusion.   
Need to Avoid Unwanted Sentencing Disparities 
 
The Defendant’s requested sentence of 12 months and a day is insufficient under §3553(a), 
especially compared to defendants in similar cases.  While the defendant must be assessed 
independently, as a general matter, defendants who have committed COVID-related fraud in this 
district have received meaningful custodial sentences greater than the one the defendant is 
requesting.  See, e.g.,  United States v. Loc Vo, 22-cr-10286-WGY (24-month sentence for 
defendant who received over $1.5 million based on multiple fraudulent applications), United States 
v. Adley Bernadin, 22-CR-10110-IT (15-month sentence for defendant who obtained over 
$400,000 in one fraudulent PPP loan and tried to obtain additional loans); United States v. Ronald 
Buie, 22-cr-10042-DPW (18-month sentence for defendant who obtained SBA loans and PUA 
payments exceeding $300,000 using stolen and fabricated identities); United States v. Elijah Buoi, 
20-cr-10130-FDS (39-month post-trial sentence for defendant that submitted fraudulent 
applications for millions in SBA loans but accessed and spent less than $30,000 in proceeds; 
defendant had exceptionally difficult childhood and served as a child soldier in Sudan); United 
States v. William Cordor, 21-cr-40016-TSH (33-month sentence for defendant that received 
$8,000 in EIDL disbursement and who also sought PUA benefits and committed aggravated 
identity theft); United States v. Roosevelt Fernandez, 21-cr10046-RGS (60-month sentence for 
recidivist defendant who fraudulently obtained $350,000 through EIDL fraud and tax offenses); 
United States v. John Casey, 20-cr-10202-ADB (48-month sentence for defendant who 
fraudulently obtained over $675,000 in EIDL and PPP funds, and who also committed two 
unrelated fraud schemes); United States v. Dana McIntyre, 21-cr-10162 (24-month sentence for 
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defendant who fraudulently obtained $679,156 in PPP and EIDL funds by inflating employees and 
monthly payroll expenses). 
The defendant will be the first of the co-conspirators in this case to be sentenced.  Pursuant 
to its plea agreement with co-defendant Adiana Pierre (Dkt. 42), the government intends to 
recommend a sentence of 30 months incarceration for Pierre.  Whereas Pierre recruited more 
borrowers (at least 12, including the defendant), caused a greater amount of losses (approximately 
$7.1 million), and profited more from the scheme (approximately $400,000), she is more culpable 
than the defendant.  She also has no criminal history and will receive the benefit of the zero-point 
offender reduction.  The government’s recommendations for the defendant and Pierre 
appropriately account for their relative culpability within the framework of the guidelines. 
Need for the Sentence to Afford Adequate Deterrence to Criminal Conduct and 
Protect the Public from Further Crimes of the Defendant 
As the pandemic spread, so too did fraud related to the CARES Act programs and other 
programs designed to provide critical economic assistance.  The government’s recommended 
sentence is appropriate to provide both general and specific deterrence.  Actors like the defendant 
who defraud one or more emergency programs not only drain those programs of limited funding; 
they also make it more difficult for administrators of government relief programs to get aid to 
individuals that qualify for and need it.  A 27-month sentence will serve as a warning and deterrent 
to others inclined to exploit similar relief programs in the future.  It will illustrate that relief 
programs are not designed to be cash grabs and that the receipt of relief funds is not a right, but 
rather a privilege afforded to those who qualify based on true and accurate information. 
CONCLUSION 
For the foregoing reasons, the government respectfully requests that the Court impose the 
government’s requested sentence of 27 months imprisonment and three years of supervised 
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release, along a special assessment of $100 and the restitution and forfeiture set forth in the plea 
agreement.  This sentence is sufficient, but not greater than necessary, to reflect the seriousness of 
the offense and the history and characteristics of the defendant, promote respect for the law, 
provide just punishment, and afford adequate deterrence. 
Respectfully submitted, 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
JOSHUA S. LEVY  
ACTING UNITED STATES ATTORNEY 
 
 
 
 
 
 
By: 
/s/ David M. Holcomb 
 
 
 
 
 
 
DAVID M. HOLCOMB 
 
 
 
 
 
 
ASSISTANT U.S. ATTORNEY 
 
Date:  May 21, 2024 
 
 
 
Certificate of Service 
 
I, David M. Holcomb, hereby certify that this document was this day filed through the ECF 
system and will be sent electronically to the registered participants as identified on the Notice of 
Electronic Filing (“NEF”). 
  
 
Date: May 21, 2024  
 
 
 
 
/s/ David M. Holcomb  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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