By US Media Group
SACRAMENTO, Calif. – A 41-year-old Sacramento man has pleaded guilty to federal charges of wire fraud and aggravated identity theft for orchestrating a scheme that stole more than $575,000 in California unemployment benefits during the early COVID-19 pandemic, authorities announced Tuesday.
Roosevelt Gulley III admitted to using stolen personal information to file at least 79 fraudulent claims for unemployment insurance through the California Employment Development Department, or EDD, between July and September 2020, according to court documents. The scheme exploited aid programs meant for workers displaced by pandemic shutdowns.
“Roosevelt Gulley collected the personally identifiable information of individuals without their knowledge to fraudulently collect unemployment insurance benefits intended for American workers who lost their jobs due to the COVID-19 pandemic,” Quentin Heiden, special agent in charge for the Western Region of the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Inspector General, said in a statement released by the U.S. attorney’s office.
Gulley obtained Social Security numbers, birth dates and names to submit the bogus applications, leading to the issuance of debit cards loaded with benefits. He then withdrew the funds from ATMs across the state, causing an actual loss exceeding $575,000, prosecutors said.
The case was investigated by the Labor Department’s Office of Inspector General and the EDD’s Investigation Division, with assistance from the U.S. Secret Service. Assistant U.S. Attorney Denise N. Yasinow is handling the prosecution.
Gulley faces a maximum of 20 years in prison for the wire fraud count and a mandatory two-year consecutive sentence for aggravated identity theft. U.S. District Judge Dale A. Drozd is set to sentence him on Jan. 26, 2026, and will weigh federal sentencing guidelines, which consider factors such as the crime’s impact and the defendant’s history.
The guilty plea comes amid ongoing efforts to combat pandemic-related fraud. Gulley’s case is being handled by the California COVID-19 Fraud Enforcement Strike Force, a multi-agency task force targeting large-scale schemes by criminal groups and transnational syndicates that profited from federal and state relief programs.
U.S. Attorney Eric Grant for the Eastern District of California emphasized the strike force’s role in holding fraudsters accountable during a period of widespread economic distress.
“These schemes not only drained taxpayer dollars but also preyed on vulnerable individuals whose identities were stolen at a time when families were already struggling,” Grant said in a news release.
Authorities have pursued hundreds of similar cases nationwide since the pandemic began, recovering billions in stolen funds. In California alone, EDD investigators have identified more than $32 billion in potential fraud from 2020 to 2022, though much of it stemmed from overwhelmed systems rather than organized crime.
