A Los Angeles couple who were convicted of helping steal $18million in COVID-19 relief funds are on the lam after cutting off their ankle monitors, the FBI said.
Richard Ayvazyan, 43, and his wife, Marietta Terabelian, 37, are considered fugitives, an FBI tweet said Tuesday.
The couple, Ayvazyan's brother and a Glendale man were convicted in June of scheming to submit phony loan applications for federal COVID-19 business relief funds.
They were scheduled to be sentenced on October 4 and were potentially facing decades in federal prison.
Four other people had pleaded guilty to various charges in what prosecutors said was a scheme that involved using fake or stolen identities to apply for loans guaranteed by the Small Business Administration to help businesses struggling because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The money obtained was used for down payments on luxury homes and to buy 'gold coins, diamonds, jewelry, luxury watches, fine imported furnishings, designer handbags, clothing, and a Harley-Davidson motorcycle,' according to a June 29 announcement from the US attorney's office.
Richard Ayvazyan, 43, and his wife, Marietta Terabelian, 37, are considered fugitives, an FBI tweet said Tuesday. The bureau said that the Los Angeles couple, who were convicted of helping steal $18million in COVID-19 relief funds, are on the lam after cutting off their ankle monitors
The FBI office in Los Angeles released a tweet asking the public for help in locating them
'They have international ties as well as local ties but we’re not ruling anything out as to where they may have fled,' FBI spokeswoman Laura Eimiller told the Los Angeles Times.
Federal investigators believe the couple left their $2.5million home in the Tarzana section of Los Angeles on Sunday.
It is the same home that they are alleged to have bought using loan money that they fraudulently obtained, according to authorities.
The federal government was in the process of confiscating the house through a court-approved forfeiture.
In March 2020, the couple and six other co-conspirators used stolen identities to open bank accounts linked to several LA area shell companies.
These companies submitted pony payrolls and forged tax returns as part of some three dozen applications for emergency loans that were approved by the federal government.
In total, Ayvazyan and his co-conspirators secured 151 loans under the Paycheck Protection and Economic Injury Disaster Loan programs that were launched to aid struggling businesses at the start of the coronavirus pandemic.
Ayvazyan, Terabelian, and two relatives were convicted by a federal jury in Los Angeles on June 25.
After their convictions in June, a federal judge denied prosecutors' request to revoke their bail before sentencing
The other four co-conspirators pleaded guilty just before the trial.
After their convictions, a federal judge rejected prosecutors’ request to revoke Ayvazyan’s bail and remand him to jail to await sentencing.
Ayvazyan’s attorney claimed that his client was not a flight risk as long as he was required to wear an ankle bracelet.
'While there is simply no reason for Ayvazyan to flee anywhere, it would be impossible for him to do so when he cannot even leave his driveway without the government's knowledge,' the attorney, Ashwin Ram, wrote in court papers.
'And if Ayvazyan wanted to flee, he would have done so already.'
The couple's three teenage children did not flee with their parents, the LA Times reported.
Last week, Ayvazyan and Terabelian asked the judge to postpone their sentencing, which was scheduled for October 4.
Prosecutors at the time warned US District Court Judge Stephen V. Wilson that there was a risk that the couple would flee.
The couple are scheduled to go on trial on state charges of mortgage fraud unrelated to the pandemic.
A decade ago, they were convicted of mortgage fraud, but they weren’t sentenced to prison. Prosecutors cited this in their argument to the judge urging him to revoke bail.
‘Defendants also have access to millions of dollars in stolen money the government has not yet been able to trace, furthering their potential means of escape and resources to evade law enforcement detection,’ they wrote.
Wilson agreed with prosecutors and the request to postpone sentencing was rejected.
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