Q Link Wireless LLC (Q Link) and its owner, Issa Asad (Asad), located in Dania Beach, Florida, have agreed to pay $110,637,057 to resolve criminal charges and civil allegations that they violated the False Claims Act by submitting false claims to the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC’s) Lifeline Program. The Lifeline Program, created by Congress in the Telecommunications Act of 1996, provides nearly $2 billion each year to assist low-income consumers with their telecommunications needs.
Q Link Wireless LLC (Q Link) and its owner, Issa Asad (Asad), located in Dania Beach, Florida, have agreed to pay $110,637,057 to resolve criminal charges and civil allegations that they violated the False Claims Act by submitting false claims to the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC’s) Lifeline Program. The Lifeline Program, created by Congress in the Telecommunications Act of 1996, provides nearly $2 billion each year to assist low-income consumers with their telecommunications needs.
Christopher Light, 22, of the District of Columbia, was sentenced today to 90 months in federal prison for his role in a 24-hour violent crime spree that included a gunpoint carjacking and armed robberies, announced U.S. Attorney Jeanine Ferris Pirro.
Antonni Flores, 29, was sentenced to 42 months of jail time for breaking into a local business, stealing money and food, and returning the next day to break in a second time to steal a TV, announced U.S. Attorney Jeanine Ferris Pirro.
Rodney Baggott, 58, of the District of Columbia, was found guilty yesterday of murder and related counts in U.S. District Court in the 2024 road rage slaying of Uber Eats driver Rasheek Abdullah near the Dupont Circle Metro Station, announced U.S. Attorney Jeanine Ferris Pirro.
Pablo Tabares-Martinez, 50, a member of the La Nueva Familia Michoacana drug cartel who was arrested in Guatemala and extradited to the United States, will serve a ten-year prison sentence following his conviction for conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute methamphetamine.
Wendell Smith, 60, of the District of Columbia, was sentenced today to 32 months in federal prison for being a previously convicted felon in possession of a loaded Glock firearm when he was stopped by police for speeding on the Suitland Parkway, announced U.S. Attorney Jeanine Ferris Pirro.
Eduardo Alberto Zelaya Vides, 31, of San Diego, California, was sentenced today in the District of Columbia to 108 months in prison in connection with repeatedly posting child sexual abuse materials to an online chatroom, with aggressively encouraging other group members to do the same, and possessing a collection of child pornography that numbered more than 2,000 digital files, announced U.S. Attorney Jeanine Ferris Pirro.
Issa Asad, 51, of Southwest Ranches, Florida, and Q Link Wireless LLC, of Dania Beach, Florida, were sentenced yesterday for conspiring to defraud and commit offenses against the United States in connection with a years-long scheme to steal over $100 million from a celebrated federal program providing discounted phone service to people in need. Asad, Q Link’s CEO, was also sentenced for laundering money from a separate scheme to defraud a different federal program meant to aid individuals and businesses hurt by the Covid-19 pandemic.
Rashad Ervin (17), Markell Butler (16), and Dereon Butler (17), all of Washington, D.C., were arrested and charged by complaint as adults under Title 16 with multiple counts of armed robbery and possession of a firearm during a crime of violence for a robbery spree in the Capitol Hill neighborhood, announced U.S. Attorney Jeanine Ferris Pirro.