Owner of technical school sentenced for defrauding VA of nearly $30M

| October 28, 2020

I think we talked about this guy a while back, but I can’t immediately find the article.

The owner of a San Diego technical training school was sentenced Tuesday to 45 months in federal custody for defrauding the Department of Veterans Affairs out of nearly $30 million in a scheme to unlawfully obtain Post-9/11 G.I. Bill benefits.

Nimesh Shah, 37, the owner of Blue Star Learning, invented fake students and falsified documents to ensure the school received VA educational benefits available for schools with a certain percentage of enrolled veterans, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

Shah pleaded guilty late last year to a wire fraud charge.

The VA issued more than $11 million in tuition payments and more than $18 million in housing allowances and stipends as a result of the scheme, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.

His sentence? 45 months confinement. That’s $666,666.67 a month. What a deal.

He’s also been ordered to forfeit $3,076,361.77 (yay) and pay the VA $29,350,999 in restitution. Good luck milking that stone.

He should have just ran for Congress.

Thanks to KoB for the tip. Source; Fox 5

Category: "Your Tax Dollars At Work", Crime, Government Incompetence, Guest Link, Veterans' Affairs Department

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5th/77th FA

Another example of why we can’t have nice things. You know, in the grand scheme of things, having enough people to investigate these places would pay off right quickly. Prolly only reason homeboy got busted is he got greedy…or somebody ratted his thieving ass out.

Wonder how much of that stolen money is in an off shore bank account, just waiting for him to be let out…in a no extridict country?

Cocksucker! I hate a thief…of any sort.

OlafTheTanker

This one local to me only got 2 years…

https://www.justice.gov/usao-nj/pr/owner-computer-school-sentenced-two-years-prison-28-million-veterans-retraining

When Fort Monmouth was being shuttered due to the BRAC boondoggle, she also cleaned up sucking in contractors as well rubber stamping those that needed certain IT certifications taken some genius deemed all of a sudden necessary for those people doing the same job for years.

The place was closing and everyone not drawing a GS level check was let go within a year anyways.

rgr769

He would have been OK with his “deals” if he was related to the Bidens. Then the Fan Belt Inspectors (FBI) would have just ignored his crimes.

2banana

I finally got my post 9/11 GI Bill.

It was about a year of mailings, online and on the phone. For hours. Repeated submissions of documents. And I swear, I finally got lucky on a VA phone call and actually had an expert on their systems who finally got it all through.

And this guy just makes up veterans and gets $30M?

LC

Garrison Courtney also just got sentenced – he only stole a measly $4M, of which he kept $1M and used the rest to continue his scheme, but was on the verge of getting an actual contract worth billions, nearly got immunity, and this has an element of ‘stolen valor’ as well, in that he posed as a CIA deep-cover agent. For anyone familiar with Frank Abagnale, there’s some similarities, but this guy is a total jackass, whereas Frank went on to help the FBI:

https://nypost.com/2020/10/28/ex-dea-spokesman-gets-7-years-in-prison-for-posing-as-cia-agent/

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8890519/Former-DEA-official-pretended-covert-CIA-spy-four-years-4-4M.html

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/former-dea-official-pleads-guilty-elaborate-4-million-fraud-scheme

(I’m putting it here because of it’s another instance of fraud against the government, but if it’s off-topic, by all means delete this.)

gitarcarver

He’s also been ordered to forfeit $3,076,361.77 (yay) and pay the VA $29,350,999 in restitution. Good luck milking that stone.

While I agree with the idea of milking a stone, the fact of the matter is that restitution cannot be discharged in a bankruptcy hearing. It sticks.

So in 45 months (less most likely) when this dirtwad gets out, even if he is flipping burgers, the government is there, taking its share.

In my mind, as these are cases essentially about money, I have no problem making some slimeball realize the real value of what they stole from vets and the rest of taxpayers.

Green Thumb

They are still looking for Poser Ed….

David

A woman who grifted $125k from my parents was ordered to pay restitution to the tune of $40k. The cop on the case said “who says crime doesn’t pay, she got paid $85 thousand by crime!”