Special to The News

BEAUMONT – A 43-year-old Beaumont woman has been sentenced for her part in a conspiracy targeting federal inmates and their families in the Eastern District of Texas, U.S. Attorney Joseph D. Brown said Friday.

Tanya L. Richard pleaded guilty on June 14 to conspiracy to commit wire fraud. U.S. District Judge Marcia Crone sentenced her to 24 months in federal prison and ordered her to pay $166,250 in restitution.

While an administrative employee of the Federal Correctional Complex iån Beaumont, Richard was involved in a widespread fraud scheme targeting the families of federal inmates. Six persons, some of whom were former federal inmates, pleaded guilty to a similar charge last year in the same scheme and are currently serving federal prison sentences.

The nationwide, six-year scheme defrauded the relatives of federal inmates by falsely representing that they could obtain reductions in their relatives’ sentences in exchange for the payment of cash and wire transfers of funds. The payments were falsely represented to be for the payment for a network of confidential informants who would make undercover drug transactions under the direction of the courts and prosecutors, which would allow the incarcerated inmates to ask the court for reductions of sentences.

In reality, the money was spent for the personal benefit of the defendants and there was never any network of informants or undercover transactions. Federal inmates do not have to pay for substantial assistance motions for reductions of sentences, which normally only require information to be provided by such inmates against co-defendants as well as trial testimony.

Richard’s role in the scheme included obtaining confidential information from federal court presentence reports of inmates and drafting false cooperation agreements for inmate families that appeared to be from federal prosecutors and U.S. attorneys. Richard is a former common-law spouse of Alvin James Warrick, who pleaded guilty to a similar charge in the scheme last year.

The scheme resulted in losses to inmate families from across the nation of over $4 million dollars. Richard was placed on administrative leave from her position at the federal prison after her indictment in April 2018.

“This kind of fraud threatens the public’s trust in the justice system,” said U.S. Attorney Joseph D. Brown. “The defendant targeted individuals and families who were vulnerable, and violated the trust that had been placed in her as a public servant. It was important that there be a real consequence for that.”

The FBI; Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General; U.S. Marshals Service; Houston Police Department-Major Offenders Division; and U.S. Attorney’s Offices in the Eastern District of Texas and Southern District of Florida investigated the case, which was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert L. Rawls.