Hazleton Man Sentenced To 25 Years’ Imprisonment For Methamphetamine Trafficking And Pandemic Fraud Offenses
Summary
A press release from the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania dated July 8, 2022. It announces that Fredy Mendoza, formerly of Hazleton, was sentenced by United States District Judge Malachy E. Mannion to 300 months' imprisonment for methamphetamine trafficking and 18 months for pandemic unemployment fraud, to run concurrently. According to the release, Mendoza pleaded guilty on July 23, 2021, to a methamphetamine distribution conspiracy and laundering drug proceeds, and also to conspiring with codefendant Christina Covey to file false Pandemic Unemployment Assistance applications for Mendoza and another federal inmate. The release states that the applications secured nearly $30,000, Mendoza was ordered to pay $29,799 in restitution, and Covey received 48 months and 15 months.
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“Hazleton Man Sentenced To 25 Years’ Imprisonment For Methamphetamine Trafficking And Pandemic Fraud Offenses.”
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Department of Justice
U.S. Attorney’s Office
Middle District of Pennsylvania
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Friday, July 8, 2022
Hazleton Man Sentenced To 25 Years’ Imprisonment For
Methamphetamine Trafficking And Pandemic Fraud
Offenses
SCRANTON- The United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania announced
that Fredy Mendoza, age 34, formerly of Hazleton, Pennsylvania, was sentenced by United States
District Judge Malachy E. Mannion, to 300 months’ imprisonment for methamphetamine
trafficking, and 18 months’ imprisonment for committing pandemic unemployment fraud, to run
concurrent with the methamphetamine trafficking sentence.
According to United States Attorney Gerard M. Karam, on July 23, 2021, Mendoza pleaded guilty to
conspiring with several other individuals to distribute and possess with intent to distribute between
5 and 15 kilograms of methamphetamine in the Hazleton area between October 2019 and July 2020
and laundering between $40,000 and $95,000 in drug proceeds. He also pleaded guilty to
distributing and possessing with intent to distribute over 50 grams of methamphetamine on
December 9, 2019.
Mendoza also pleaded guilty to committing pandemic unemployment fraud while incarcerated and
awaiting trial on the federal narcotics charges. The Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA)
program was created by the March 2020 CARES Act, as part of the United States government’s
efforts to mitigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the public’s health and economic well-
being. The PUA program was designed to provide unemployment benefits to individuals not eligible
for regular unemployment compensation or extended unemployment benefits.
Mendoza pleaded guilty to conspiring with his codefendant, Christina Covey, formerly of Drums,
Pennsylvania, to file false PUA applications on his behalf and for another federal inmate. The
applications sought unemployment benefits for both inmates by claiming that they were laid off
because of the COVID-19 pandemic and available to work, despite their incarceration on underlying
federal drug trafficking charges. The conspirators subsequently filed false weekly certifications
required to continue receiving PUA benefits, ultimately securing nearly $30,000 dollars, which were
mailed in debit cards to Covey. Mendoza was ordered to pay $29,799 in restitution.
Covey was also Mendoza’s codefendant in the methamphetamine trafficking case. Covey previously
pleaded guilty to both methamphetamine trafficking, and to conspiring to commit pandemic
unemployment fraud. She was sentenced by Judge Mannion to 48 months’ imprisonment for the
methamphetamine trafficking, and 15 months’ imprisonment for committing pandemic
unemployment fraud, five months of which were to run consecutive to the methamphetamine
trafficking sentence.
The methamphetamine trafficking case was investigated by Homeland Security Investigations, and
prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Jenny P. Roberts. The pandemic fraud case was investigated
by the Postal Inspection Service and by the Department of Labor, Office of the Inspector General,
and was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Phillip J. Caraballo.
On May 17, 2021, the Attorney General established the COVID-19 Fraud Enforcement Task Force to
marshal the resources of the Department of Justice in partnership with agencies across government
to enhance efforts to combat and prevent pandemic-related fraud. The Task Force bolsters efforts to
investigate and prosecute the most culpable domestic and international criminal actors and assists
agencies tasked with administering relief programs to prevent fraud by, among other methods,
augmenting and incorporating existing coordination mechanisms, identifying resources and
techniques to uncover fraudulent actors and their schemes, and sharing and harnessing information
and insights gained from prior enforcement efforts. For more information on the Department’s
response to the pandemic, please visit https://www.justice.gov/coronavirus.
Anyone with information about allegations of attempted fraud involving COVID-19 can report it by
calling the Department of Justice’s National Center for Disaster Fraud (NCDF) Hotline at 866-720-
5721 or via the NCDF Web Complaint Form at: https://www.justice.gov/disaster-fraud/ncdf-
disaster-complaint-form.
The narcotics investigation was part of an Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces
(OCDETF) operation. OCDETF identifies, disrupts, and dismantles the highest-level criminal
organizations that threaten the United States using a prosecutor-led, intelligence-driven, multi-
agency approach. Additional information about the OCDETF Program can be found
at https://www.justice.gov/OCDETF.
This case was also part of the joint federal, state, and local Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN)
Program, the centerpiece of the Department of Justice’s violent crime reduction efforts. PSN is an
evidence-based program proven to be effective at reducing violent crime. Through PSN, a broad
spectrum of stakeholders work together to identify the most pressing violent crime problems in the
community and develop comprehensive solutions to address them. As part of this strategy, PSN
focuses enforcement efforts on the most violent offenders and partners with locally based prevention
and reentry programs for lasting reductions in crime.
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Topic(s): Component(s):
Coronavirus USAO - Pennsylvania, Middle
Project Safe Neighborhoods
Drug Trafficking
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