Philadelphia Woman Sentenced to Five Years in Prison For Defrauding Her Employer of More Than $250,000 and the U.S. Government of $23,000

PHILADELPHIA – United States Attorney David Metcalf announced that Kimberly Lawson, 44, of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, was sentenced today by United States District Court Judge Michael M. Baylson to 60 months in prison, five years of supervised release, and $244,343 in restitution, for the unauthorized use of her employer’s identity to embezzle from him and his company and her fraudulent applications to the Small Business Administration (SBA) to obtain Economic Injury Disaster Loans (“EIDL”).

In September 2023, Lawson was charged by indictment with one count of bank fraud, one count of aggravated identity theft, and four counts of wire fraud, and pleaded guilty to all charges against her in September 2024.

The fraud loss attributed to Lawson for the workplace embezzlement is $250,817.80, and for the fraud against the government $23,000, for a total fraud loss amount of $273,817.80.

In March 2018, Lawson began working as the office manager of an area electrical contracting company, where her responsibilities included tracking employee hours, invoices, and vendor payments, and writing checks to vendors from the company’s bank account. She was also responsible for reconciling bank statements, reviewing images of checks, and confirming the checks cleared. Lawson did not have signature authority on the checks but was authorized to use her employer’s signature stamp to sign the checks he authorized.

As detailed in court filings and admitted to by the defendant, between 2018 and 2020, Lawson used her knowledge and access to divert significant amounts of the company’s money to external accounts that she controlled, through hundreds of fraudulent vendor and employee payments, unauthorized payroll transactions, and unauthorized electronic transfers. To avoid discovery of her fraudulent activities, Lawson intentionally mislabeled entries in the company’s accounting software, making them look authentic by recording them as legitimate payables.

In addition, the defendant attempted to steal money from her employer’s 401k account, submitting two separate loan requests totaling more than $17,000, but her employer learned of and was able to cancel the requests before any funds were disbursed.

In addition to the workplace embezzlement, Lawson fraudulently sought $253,874 in EIDLs from the SBA, filed in 15 separate applications in different names including her own. Only the applications that she submitted in her husband’s and his sister’s names were approved for funding, with each receiving $8,500 and $14,500, respectively, deposited into bank accounts controlled by Lawson. Among numerous false statements made in the applications, Lawson falsely represented that she had a retail business, that her husband had a construction business, and her sister-in-law had a cleaning business.

In 2012, Lawson was convicted in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania of defrauding a different employer of more than $293,000 and received a sentence of 21 months’ imprisonment.

“Kimberly Lawson’s greed is her downfall,” said U.S. Attorney Metcalf. “This is now the second time that she’s being sentenced for stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from an employer — and this go-round, she decided to defraud the federal government, as well. Perhaps today’s longer prison term will prove more impactful than her first. Either way, we won’t rest until criminals like this get the message that we will find and punish financial fraud.”

“Through a multitude of deceptions and manipulations, Ms. Lawson stole from her employer and from the United States in the pursuit of her own personal gain,” said Assistant Special Agent in Charge Dave Carter of FBI Philadelphia. “This sentencing serves as a reminder that those who exploit their positions for financial profits will be held accountable. I want to thank our FBI personnel and our partners at the U.S. Attorney’s Office for their diligent efforts in bringing this defendant to justice.”

The case was investigated by the FBI and is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Anita Eve.