A Hummelstown, Pennsylvania, man was sentenced today to 120 months in prison for a scheme to fraudulently obtain emergency funds meant for those affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, United States Attorney David Metcalf announced.
Ardavan Alamoutinia, 36, was sentenced by United States District Judge Juan R. Sánchez to 120 months in prison, three years of supervised release, and restitution of $3,177,376, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania said.
Alamoutinia was charged by indictment in May 2023 and pleaded guilty this March to one count of conspiracy to commit wire and mail fraud, 10 counts of mail fraud, one count of theft of government money, and one count of aggravated identity theft.
According to court filings, Alamoutinia and his co-defendant, Aryanah Davison, 26, of Harrisburg, used stolen identities to file over 500 fraudulent applications for Pandemic Unemployment Assistance. The applications used at least 375 identities of current or former employees of Company 1, personally identifiable information a co-conspirator had stolen and transferred to Davison.
The fraudulent applications were filed in 27 different states, resulting in a loss to the government of at least $2,886,876. The two converted at least $2,500,000 of the proceeds, spending part of it on a luxury sports vehicle and hundreds of thousands of dollars of cryptocurrency.
Davison pleaded guilty to her role in the scheme in January 2025 and will be sentenced at a later date. The case was investigated by the Department of Labor Office of Inspector General, Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General, United States Postal Inspection Service, National Aeronautics and Space Administration Office of Inspector General, and the Social Security Administration Office of Inspector General, and is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney S. Chandler Harris.