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Raheel Malik

Defendant

Type
Person
Role
Defendant
Updated

The profile

A Sugar Land, Texas man who pleaded guilty in November 2021 in the Amir Aqeel PPP ring, waited more than two years for sentencing and received 18 months in prison and $3,147,007.14 in restitution.

Identity and role

Raheel Malik, 43 at sentencing, of Sugar Land, Texas, was charged by a one-count criminal information in United States v. Malik, No. 4:21-cr-00530 (S.D. Tex.), filed November 3, 2021. The case was reassigned to U.S. District Judge Andrew S. Hanen, who was presiding over United States v. Aqeel, No. 4:20-cr-00583, and his plea and sentencing were entered on both dockets.

The scheme and pandemic-relief role

The Justice Department says the ring led by Amir Aqeel obtained more than $20 million in forgivable PPP loans in 2020 by overstating employee counts and average monthly payroll, supported by fake bank records and federal tax forms. Part of the money was laundered through checks to fake employees, cashed at check-cashing businesses. The public record does not say which loans Malik handled. His restitution is owed jointly with Aqeel, Siddiq Azeemuddin, Rifat Bajwa, Abdul Fatani, Pardeep Basra and a defendant in a related case, Bijan Rajabi. Azeemuddin, sentenced in October 2023, was ordered to pay $3,147,007 from the same pool.

  • Charged: criminal information (one count), November 3, 2021; released on a $30,000 unsecured bond.
  • Pleaded guilty: November 8, 2021, before Judge Hanen, under a plea agreement. Sentencing was first set for March 7, 2022.
  • Sentenced: January 4, 2024, to 18 months in prison, three years of supervised release and $3,147,007.14 in restitution to the SBA (judgment entered January 12, 2024, Doc. 759 in No. 4:20-cr-00583).

Where they are now (2025–2026)

The court allowed him to report to the Bureau of Prisons on his own. We found no public record of him after the January 2024 judgment.

Sources

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