Former Postal Employee Admits Fraud in Connection with Unemployment Insurance Benefits

Summary

A press release from the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of New Jersey, dated April 14, 2022 and numbered 22-142, announcing that former U.S. Postal Service employee Ross Clayton, 31, of Irvington, New Jersey, pleaded guilty by videoconference before U.S. District Judge Julien X. Neals to an information charging him with conspiring to commit wire fraud. According to the release, Clayton took unemployment insurance benefits-related mail, including debit cards, from a USPS location in New Jersey and used it to obtain benefits to which he was not entitled. It describes the CARES Act programs PUA and FPUC, notes a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison, and sets sentencing for Sept. 7, 2022.

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Full text

                                                             United States Attorney
                                                             District of New Jersey

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                                CONTACT:       Matthew Reilly
April 14, 2022                                                      Office of Public Affairs
www.justice.gov/usao/nj                                             (973) 645-2888


      FORMER POSTAL EMPLOYEE ADMITS FRAUD IN CONNECTION WITH
                 UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE BENEFITS

       NEWARK, N.J. – A former U.S. Postal Service USPS employee today admitted that he
conspired to fraudulently obtain unemployment insurance benefits, U.S. Attorney Philip R.
Sellinger announced.

        Ross Clayton, 31, of Irvington, New Jersey, pleaded guilty by videoconference before
U.S. District Judge Julien X. Neals to an information charging him with conspiring to commit
wire fraud.

       According to documents filed in the case and statements made in court:

       On March 27, 2020, the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES
Act) was signed into law. The CARES Act created a new temporary federal unemployment
insurance program called Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA), which provided
unemployment insurance benefits for individuals who were not eligible for other types of
unemployment (the self-employed, independent contractors, gig economy workers). The CARES
Act also created a new temporary federal program called Federal Pandemic Unemployment
Assistance (FPUC) that provided an additional $600 weekly benefit to those eligible for PUA
and regular unemployment insurance benefits.

        Clayton was a USPS employee. Clayton took unemployment insurance benefits-related
mail, including debit cards, from a USPS location in New Jersey and used that mail to obtain
unemployment insurance benefits to which he was not entitled.

       The charge of conspiring to commit wire fraud is punishable by a maximum potential
penalty of 20 years in prison and a fine of the greater of $250,000, twice the gross profits to
Stokes or twice the gross loss suffered by the victims. Sentencing is scheduled for Sept. 7, 2022.

        U.S. Attorney Sellinger credited special agents of the U.S. Department of Labor, Office
of Inspector General, under the direction of Special Agent in Charge Jonathan Mellone in
Manhattan; and postal inspectors of the U.S. Postal Inspection Service in Newark, under the
direction of Postal Inspector in Charge Damon Wood, Philadelphia Division, with the
investigation leading to today’s guilty plea.

       The government is represented by Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Kogan of the U.S.
Attorney’s Office Cybercrime Unit in Newark.

22-142                             ###
Defense counsel: Robert M. Perry, Mount Holly, New Jersey


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