A federal grand jury in Santa Ana, California, returned a superseding indictment charging a California man with wire fraud and money laundering for making fraudulent claims to the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) and the Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL) program. He had previously been charged with tax evasion and filing false corporate tax returns. According to the superseding indictment, from May 2020 to December 2021, Mehrdad “Mitch” Tabrizi, of Aliso Viejo, submitted two fraudulent PPP applications on behalf of Life Fleet Inc., a California business he owned, seeking $695,565 in loans. In the applications, Tabrizi allegedly claimed that Life Fleet had at least 54 employees and monthly payroll obligations of $139,313. After receiving the PPP funds, Tabrizi allegedly used the proceeds for personal expenses. Similarly, Tabrizi allegedly filed a false EIDL application claiming that Life Fleet had gross revenues of more than $4 million and 63 employees. In reality, however, Life Fleet allegedly was not in business, had no revenue and had no employees.
Tabrizi also allegedly filed a fraudulent EIDL application in the name of Resonante Group Inc., a California company he controlled. According to the superseding indictment, this EIDL application falsely claimed Resonante Group had gross revenues of more than $19 million and over 300 employees. As a result, the Small Business Administration allegedly disbursed approximately $319,800 into bank accounts controlled by Tabrizi, which he was not entitled to receive and used for personal expenses. Tabrizi was previously charged with tax evasion and filing false tax returns. According to the superseding indictment, Tabrizi operated Socal Medical Transportation Inc., a company incorporated in California. In 2015 and 2016, Tabrizi allegedly deposited approximately $2.6 million of income into a bank account but did not disclose these funds to the CPA firm he hired to prepare Socal Medical’s corporate tax returns. Instead, Tabrizi allegedly informed the CPA firm that these funds had been received by a separate business.
