California woman tried to avoid prison time for COVID relief scheme by fleeing to Montenegro. Feds say it didn't work.
A California woman who abandoned two teenage daughters and her imprisoned husband and fled to a tiny Mediterranean country after being convicted of helping steal $20 million in pandemic relief funds has been extradited to the United States.
Federal officials on Tuesday said they have taken into custody Tamara Dadyan, 43, who was facing a 10-year prison sentence when she skipped out to Montenegro early last year.
She pleaded guilty in June 2021 to conspiring with her husband, brother-in-law and his wife and others to fleece taxpayers by signing up for pandemic assistance under dozens of fake or stolen identities.
Authorities said the eight-person fraud ring used the proceeds buy three California homes, gold coins and jewelry, cryptocurrency and a Harley-Davidson motorcycle.
Dadyan's husband is currently serving a 17-year federal prison sentence following his conviction. Dadyan was supposed to turn herself in to begin her sentence early last year but instead fled to Montenegro, authorities said, joining co-defendants Richard Ayvazyan, 43, his wife Marietta Terabelian, 37, who had been convicted in absentia.
The Los Angeles Times reported that Ayvazyan and Terabelian had cut off their GPS trackers, flew to Montenegro on a private jet using forged Mexican passports, and set up new lives under fake identities in a seaside villa overlooking the Bay of Kotor on the Adriatic Sea.
Montenegran authorities arrested all three in February last year. Ayvazyan and Terabelian were extradited in November. Thom Mrozek, a spokesman for the Department of Justice, told USA TODAY that Dayden's extradition took longer due to procedural delays in Montenegro.
Federal prosecutors say they have seized more than $78 million in cash obtained by relief fraudsters, along with numerous real estate properties and luxury items. Watchdogs say billions of dollars of pandemic aid have been improperly diverted, and congressional investigations are ongoing.
The Associated Press contributed.
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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: PPP fraud conviction: California woman helped steal $20 million, fled
