Delaware woman sentenced on fraud charges

NORFOLK, Va. – A 50-year-old Delaware woman was sentenced Wednesday to 144 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release, for conspiring to obtain payment for false claims and mail fraud. This case was investigated by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and Internal Revenue Service (IRS) – Criminal Investigation.

Linda Avila, of Frankford, Delaware pleaded guilty Nov 17.

According to court documents, Avila and unindicted co-conspirators devised a scheme to file false income tax returns using forms obtained from illegal aliens on the Eastern Shore of Virginia and elsewhere. Avila altered the W-2 forms by using white out to cover up the names, Social Security numbers and addresses, and then wrote in the illegal aliens’ names and addresses and filed the fraudulent returns.

She also created fake W-2 forms and notarized fake identity documents to facilitate her fraudulent filings. The addresses listed on the forms were for post office boxes and residential addresses to which she or a co-conspirator had access. Once the refund checks arrived, she provided fake identification documents to co-conspirators so they could cash the checks. 

An arrest warrant and search warrant were executed at her home in Delaware and agents seized approximately 17 boxes of fraudulent tax records. Templates for fraudulent W-2 forms and identification documents were also found on her computer. The records included copies of approximately 1,754 tax returns filed between 2008 and 2014 for tax years 2004 through 2013.  The total loss to the IRS based on the fraudulent returns is approximately $7.2 million.