{"id":316447,"date":"2026-10-28T23:36:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-28T23:36:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/316447\/"},"modified":"2026-10-28T23:36:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-28T23:36:09","slug":"allentown-woman-admits-to-defrauding-federal-govt-out-of-over-1m-in-covid-19-pandemic-relief-loans-allentown-area","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/316447\/","title":{"rendered":"Allentown woman admits to defrauding federal govt. out of over $1M in COVID-19 pandemic relief loans\u00a0 | Allentown Area"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>PHILADELPHIA \u2013 A Lehigh County woman pleaded guilty Tuesday in federal court to charges of wire fraud and conspiracy to file false claims, according to a news release from the U.S. Attorney\u2019s Office, Eastern District of Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n<p>Mayerlyn Cordero, 48, of Allentown, was indicted in February for her part in a scheme to defraud the U.S. government\u2019s Paycheck Protection Program and Economic Injury Disaster Loan program, the news release says.<\/p>\n<p>According to officials, Cordero filed 13 false and fraudulent applications, totaling about $1,009,050 in funded loans.<\/p>\n<p>Both federal programs were established as part of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, enacted in March 2020.<\/p>\n<p>The news release says Cordero also defrauded the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).<\/p>\n<p>Cordero admitted to filing two fraudulent PPP loan applications in the name of May Tax, the tax preparation business that she operated, the U.S. Attorney\u2019s Office says.<\/p>\n<p>The Attorney&#8217;s Office says she included a false tax document and false information that inflated her number of employees.<\/p>\n<p>In those applications, officials say Cordero also included a fraudulent EIDL application for May Tax that falsely inflated her number of employees.<\/p>\n<p>Additionally, Cordero was indicted for filing false and fraudulent PPP applications for other companies, R&amp;P Trucking and KS Transport.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>According to the news release, Cordero knowingly filed 23 fraudulent tax returns using stolen personal information provided by a co-conspirator.<\/p>\n<p>Officials say Cordero will be sentenced Feb. 3. She faces five counts of wire fraud, and each count carries a maximum possible term of 20 years in prison, three years of supervised release and a fine of $250,000, the U.S. Attorney\u2019s Office said.<\/p>\n<p>For the conspiracy charge, she faces a maximum possible sentence of 10 years in prison, three years of supervised release and a $250,000 fine.<\/p>\n<p>\nCopyright 2026 Maranatha Broadcasting Co., Inc.. All Rights Reserved.\n<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHILADELPHIA \u2013 A Lehigh County woman pleaded guilty Tuesday in federal court to charges of wire fraud and&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":316448,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[119,121,120,54048,25200,129029,129028,75179,23590,23586],"class_list":["post-316447","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-allentown","tag-allentown","tag-allentown-headlines","tag-allentown-news","tag-cares-act","tag-economic-injury-disaster-loan","tag-mayerlyn-cordero","tag-ppp-loan-fraud","tag-tax-fraud","tag-u-s-attorney","tag-wire-fraud"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316447","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=316447"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316447\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/316448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=316447"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=316447"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=316447"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}