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SALT LAKE CITY — A Herriman man has been accused of lying about being a convicted felon on small business loan applications during the pandemic to receiving more than $180,000.
A federal grand jury indicted Carter Lane Lucas, 47, on accusations of wire fraud. The indictment said Lucas defrauded the COVID-19 relief Paycheck Protection Program and Economic Injury Disaster Loan Program of about $182,800 in loan funds.
Lucas submitted multiple loan applications through Mountain America Credit Union and the Small Business Administration between April 2020 and August 2021 and used the loan money for his personal benefit, a statement from the U.S. Attorney's Office District of Utah says.
Lucas stated on his loan applications he had not been convicted of a felony in the last five years and that he had no criminal history. The indictment said Lucas has been convicted of a felony, and so his loan applications were submitted with false information. The indictment did not specify Lucas' previous felony.
His first court appearance on the indictments is scheduled for Wednesday.
Lucas is one of thousands of people accused or convicted of illegally obtaining or misusing federal funds from COVID-19 relief programs.
The Associated Press reported there was more than $280 million obtained through the program under false pretenses, with another $123 billion wasted or misspent.
The loss represents close to 10% of the $4.3 trillion the U.S. government disbursed to mitigate the economic devastation wrought by the COVID-19 pandemic, according to an analysis by the Associated Press.
The people who have been charged or convicted in the cases came from all walks of life and all corners of the globe, the report found, including a Tennessee rapper who bragged about the ease of stealing more than $700,000 in pandemic unemployment insurance on YouTube.
Nearly 3,200 defendants have been charged with COVID-19 relief fraud, according to the U.S. Justice Department. About $1.4 billion in stolen pandemic aid has been seized.
