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A federal charge of mail fraud has been resolved with a guilty plea from Gayle Ferngren, 69, of Rush City. She was facing charges for participating in a scheme to launder proceeds generated from scams that involved pandemic assistance programs.  Ferngren would deposit fraudulently gotten pandemic aid using unknowing victim names and data, and also distributed proceeds amongst other scam offenders.

U.S. Attorney Andrew Luger reported the guilty plea was presented to U.S. District Court Judge Tunheim.  Sentencing is later.  The U.S. Postal Service, FBI and Dept of Labor-Office of the Inspector General helped to conduct the investigation.

In a press release May 22.  the offenses related to the guilty plea were described as happening from June 2020 through December 2020.  Ferngren acknowledges she received at least 68 debit cards loaded with approximately $1.6 million in fraudulent unemployment benefits, to which she was not entitled.  In total the U.S. Attorney says $1.8 million in fraud occurred.  

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