Nicholas J. Ganjei United States Attorney for the Southern District of Texas | U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Texas
A former employee of the Social Security Administration (SSA) has admitted guilt in a case involving conspiracy and aggravated identity theft, as reported by U.S. Attorney Nicholas J. Ganjei.
David Lam, 45, from Pearland, served as an operations supervisor and claims specialist at the SSA office in Houston. In his plea agreement, Lam confessed to stealing personal identifying information (PII) of recently deceased individuals to facilitate fraudulent benefits applications.
Lam worked with various accomplices, typically women with children, to file fraudulent survivor benefits applications. These applications falsely listed the deceased men as fathers or stepfathers of the children involved. This misrepresentation would have entitled these women to receive benefits while raising their children as widows, despite having no real connection to the men on the applications. The deceased individuals did not father these children. To carry out this scheme, Lam used details such as names, dates of birth and death, and Social Security numbers of the deceased.
Lam instructed his co-conspirators to share the fraudulently obtained funds with him using financial applications like Zelle, CashApp or Chime. He has agreed to accept responsibility for causing a loss of $3,346,280 to the SSA and will pay this amount in restitution.
U.S. District Judge Sim Lake is scheduled to sentence Lam on September 12. At sentencing, Lam could face up to five years in federal prison for conspiracy charges and a maximum fine of $250,000. Additionally, he faces two years for aggravated identity theft that must run consecutively with any other sentence imposed.
The investigation was conducted by the SSA-Office of Inspector General with Assistant U.S. Attorney Brad Gray prosecuting the case.
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