Macomb County mother and boyfriend sentenced to jail for UI fraud scheme

A couple described by federal prosecutors as a "pandemic-era Bonnie and Clyde" for their roles in an unemployment insurance benefit fraud scheme that netted $1.3 million were each sentenced to prison, according to authorities.

Sentenced Tuesday by U.S. District Judge Gershwin A. Drain were Mitchacole Johnson, 45, of Shelby Township, and her boyfriend Larry Witherspoon, 46, of Harper Woods. Johnson received a three-year sentence, while Witherspoon will spend four years behind bars.

"These defendants exploited the current pandemic to defraud the State of Michigan and United States for their own personal gain. My office is committed to prosecuting any person who used the Covid-19 crisis to inflict more harm on the people of Michigan," U.S. Attorney Dawn Ison said in a statement.

Federal prosecutors said the pair "seem to have been motivated primarily by vice and greed" as their forfeiture paper spans four pages and includes 24 items of high-end jewelry, 37 designer handbags, and "significant" spending on gambling.

Authorities said the two were responsible for filing at least 66 claims for fraudulent unemployment insurance benefits in at least four states, including Michigan.

According to court records, here is how the scam worked: from May 2020 through at least August 2020, Johnson filed a number of claims in her own name, while Witherspoon filed multiple claims in the names of people who had names similar to his own, such as "Lawrence Witherspoon".

Both Johnson and Witherspoon filed their claims using other people's Social Security numbers and had the benefits deposited into a variety of bank accounts, some connected to pre-paid debit cards.

When FBI agents raided Johnson's house on Lakeside Boulevard, they found $66,900 inside of a safe in the residence that she has agreed to forfeit, court documents show.

"Both Defendants manipulated the unemployment insurance system and stole taxpayer dollars

for their own personal benefit," James A. Tarasca, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI's

Detroit Division, said in a statement.

Investigators said it was a highly successful plan that required an intimate knowledge of how unemployment insurance fraud works.

"And when contrasted with the significant need experienced by so many during the Covid-19 pandemic, their scheme strikes an especially repugnant chord," federal prosecutors wrote.

Johnson is a mother of one daughter and hopes to eventually become a nurse, according to defense attorney Steven Scharg of Detroit.

"It is unfortunate that Defendant Johnson is in this situation," Scharg wrote in a sentencing memo. "She had a

successful scholastic life, been working regularly and ended up sliding into this terrible situation that she's in now."

Witherspoon was employed in property management and has an extensive list of medical issues, including obesity, prediabetes, right sciatica issues, elevated blood pressure, a urinary tract infection, an enlarged thyroid, severe headaches and carpal tunnel syndrome, according to attorney Henry Scharg.

At the time of the scheme, Witherspoon was out on on bond for a fraud offense out of Collin County, Texas, while Johnson had a pending fraud case out of Shelby Township.