Man Charged in Massive Check-Cashing Fraud in Miami

Monday, July 9, 2018 | 0

A man who was convicted of workers' compensation fraud in 2012 has now been charged in connection with a $500 million fraudulent check-cashing enterprise that helped contractors pay workers in cash and avoid compensation costs.

Evelio Suarez, of Miami, ran three stores that were a key part of a the massive fraud scheme, prosecutors said, according to a news report.

Suarez is charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering, bribing a bank employee and tampering with a grand jury witness.

Also arrested was Enrique Iglesias, 44, of Homestead, who was charged with money laundering by cashing $150 million in fraudulent checks for illegal businesses.

A federal judge ordered that Suarez, who came to Florida from Cuba in 1995, be held without bond. He faces up to 30 years in prison. 

Suarez’s modus operandi was to cash checks, some as large as $400,000, for criminals in the health care and construction sectors of Miami-Dade’s robust black-market economy, according to the Miami Herald. 

Scofflaws turned to Suarez as their money man because they operated pharmacies in other people’s names while falsely billing Medicare, or they paid undocumented construction workers in cash to avoid paying federal taxes and worker’s compensation insurance, prosecutors said. 

The arrests are part of a nationwide investigation into health care fraud, insurance fraud and bank fraud, prosecutors said.