What Happens When Your Lender Reports Your PPP Loan to Authorities? | Federal Fraud Defense
So your probably having a complete panic attack right now because your bank just called or sent a letter saying they’re reporting your PPP loan to the SBA or federal authorities for suspected fraud. Maybe your bank account was suddenly frozen without warning. Maybe you tried to access your funds and discovered there flagged for suspicious activity. Or maybe you just heard that banks are required to report fraudulent PPP loans and your worried because you made mistakes on your application. Look, we get it. Your ABSOLUTELY TERRIFIED because having your lender report your loan sounds like your already being accused of a crime and federal investigators are coming after you. And honestly? You should be taking this seriously! Because when a lender reports your PPP loan to authorities, it triggers a formal fraud investigation by the SBA Office of Inspector General, the FBI, and potentially the Department of Justice, and these investigations can result in criminal charges carrying up to 30 years in federal prison under 18 U.S.C. § 1344 for bank fraud or 18 U.S.C. § 1343 for wire fraud!
We’ve represented dozens of clients whose PPP loans were reported by lenders to federal authorities, and we know exactly what happens next in the investigation process. A lender report doesn’t automatically mean your going to be charged with a crime, but it means your loan has been flagged for serious investigation and how you respond in the next few weeks will determine whether this escalates to criminal prosecution or gets resolved without charges.
Banks and lenders are required by federal law to report suspicious activity related to PPP loans through Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs) filed with the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network. These reports trigger investigations, freeze accounts, and put you squarely on the radar of multiple federal law enforcement agencies. Understanding why lenders report loans, what happens after a report is filed, what your rights are, and what steps you must take immediately is critical for protecting yourself against criminal prosecution.
Why Would My Lender Report My PPP Loan?
Banks and PPP lenders report loans to federal authorities when they identify red flags or suspicious activity that suggests fraud or illegal use of funds. Lenders are legally required to monitor accounts for suspicious activity and report potential fraud, so reporting isn’t optional when certain triggers are identified.
The most common reason lenders report PPP loans is suspicious use of funds after the loan was deposited. Banks monitor how PPP proceeds are used, and certain transaction patterns automatically trigger fraud alerts. If you deposited your PPP loan and immediately withdrew large amounts of cash, your bank flagged the activity as suspicious. We’re talking about withdrawing $10,000 or more in cash shortly after the PPP deposit, which looks like your trying to hide how the money is being used or avoid creating a paper trail.
Purchases of luxury items right after receiving PPP funds trigger reports too. If your PPP loan hits your account on Monday and by Friday your bank sees a $50,000 wire transfer to a car dealership for a Mercedes, or a $30,000 payment to a jewelry store, or a $75,000 down payment on a boat, there going to report that as potential misuse of funds. The PPP program required funds to be used primarily for payroll, rent, utilities, and specific business expenses. Luxury purchases don’t fall within authorized uses and suggest you obtained the loan fraudulently with no intention of using it for legitimate business purposes.
Wire transfers to foreign accounts or cryptocurrency exchanges are massive red flags that trigger immediate reports. If you received PPP funds and wired money overseas, especialy to countries known for money laundering, your bank filed a SAR and probably froze your account. Cryptocurrency purchases using PPP funds raise similar concerns because crypto transactions can be difficult to trace and suggest your trying to hide the money.
Commingling business and personal funds in ways that make it impossible to track PPP usage triggers reports. If you deposited your PPP loan into a business account but then immediately transferred most of it to personal accounts and used it for personal expenses that clearly weren’t business-related, your banks fraud detection systems caught that pattern and reported it.
Lack of payroll activity after claiming the loan was for payroll costs is another major trigger. The PPP application process required certifying you needed the loan for payroll and would use funds primarily for employee compensation. If you got a $150,000 loan claiming you needed it for payroll but your account shows zero payroll payments, no payroll tax deposits, no payments to payroll processors, and no checks to employees for months after receiving the funds, your lender concluded you lied about needing the loan for payroll and reported the fraud.
Application inconsistencies discovered during the forgiveness process trigger reports too. When you applied for loan forgiveness, you submitted documentation showing how you used the funds. If that documentation contradicted information in your original loan application, or if the lender discovered you fabricated payroll records or tax documents to support forgiveness, they reported the loan to the SBA and federal authorities.
Some lenders also report loans based on information received from the SBA. The SBA uses “hold codes” to flag suspicious loans and communicates with lenders about potentially fraudulent applications. If the SBA flagged your loan and asked your lender to investigate, the lender’s investigation might have uncovered problems that required reporting to federal authorities.
Third-party tips sometimes trigger lender reports. If a whistleblower contacted your bank claiming you committed fraud to get your PPP loan, the bank investigated those allegations and reported there findings to authorities if the allegations appeared credible. We’ve seen cases where ex-business partners, former employees, or ex-spouses reported people to banks claiming fraud, and the bank investigated and filed SARs based on those complaints.
What Is a Suspicious Activity Report (SAR)?
A Suspicious Activity Report is a document that financial institutions are required to file with the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network whenever they detect transactions or patterns that might indicate fraud, money laundering, or other illegal activity. Understanding SARs is critical because this is the mechanism through which your lender reports your PPP loan to authorities and triggers federal investigations.
SARs are mandated by the Bank Secrecy Act and related regulations that require financial institutions to monitor customer accounts and report suspicious activity. Banks don’t file SARs because they want to get you in trouble, they file them because federal law requires it and banks face massive penalties for failing to report suspicious activity. Financial institutions can be fined millions of dollars for not filing required SARs, so they err on the side of caution and file reports whenever there’s any question about whether activity might be suspicious.
The SAR filing process works like this: your bank’s fraud detection systems or compliance officers identify suspicious activity related to your account. They conduct an internal investigation to determine if the activity warrants a SAR filing. If they conclude it does, they prepare a detailed report describing the suspicious activity, the amounts involved, the parties involved, and why the bank believes the activity might be criminal. This report is filed electronically with FinCEN within 30 days of detecting the suspicious activity.
What makes SARs particularly problematic is that your legally prohibited from knowing about them. Federal law makes it a crime for banks to tell you that a SAR has been filed on your account. This means your bank can file a report accusing you of fraud, send that report to federal law enforcement agencies, and you have no idea it happened until FBI agents show up at your door months later. You can’t defend yourself against allegations in a SAR you don’t even know exists.
The content of SARs includes detailed information about your loan, your account activity, specific transactions the bank considers suspicious, copies of relevant documents like your PPP application and bank statements, the bank’s analysis of why the activity suggests fraud, and recommendations about whether law enforcement should investigate. Banks don’t just check a box saying “suspicious activity,” they provide narrative descriptions and substantial documentation supporting there fraud allegations.
Once FinCEN receives the SAR, the information is shared with federal law enforcement agencies including the FBI, Secret Service, IRS Criminal Investigation, and the SBA Office of Inspector General. These agencies use SAR data to identify potential fraud cases and prioritize investigations. If your SAR shows significant red flags or large dollar amounts, it goes to the top of the investigation queue and agents start working on your case immediately.
Multiple SARs on the same person or loan escalate priority dramatically. If your PPP loan triggered a SAR from your bank, and then you opened an account at a different bank and that bank also filed a SAR, and maybe a third financial institution where you moved money also filed a SAR, federal investigators see a pattern of suspicious activity across multiple institutions and treat your case as high priority fraud investigation.
SARs create a permanent record in federal databases that law enforcement can access indefinitely. Even if your not investigated immediately after a SAR is filed, that report stays in the system and can be accessed years later if your investigated for other reasons. We’ve seen cases where SARs filed about PPP loans in 2020 weren’t acted on until 2024 when prosecutors finally got around to investigating the backlog of fraud reports.
What Happens Immediately After the Report Is Filed?
Once your lender files a Suspicious Activity Report or otherwise reports your PPP loan to authorities, several things happen in rapid succession that directly affect you and your ability to access funds. Understanding this immediate aftermath helps you know what to expect and how to respond.
The first thing that often happens is your bank account gets frozen or placed on hold. If the bank believes your using PPP funds fraudulently, there not going to let you continue withdrawing money while they investigate and report to authorities. You’ll try to access your account online or withdraw money from an ATM and discover the account is restricted. You might get a letter from the bank saying your account has been placed on hold pending investigation. Or you might just find that your debit card doesn’t work and online transfers are blocked.
Account freezes can be partial or complete. Partial freezes might block withdrawals but allow deposits. Complete freezes lock the entire account and you can’t access any funds at all. The freeze typically stays in place until federal authorities determine whether to seize the funds or release the account, which can take weeks or months.
Some banks close your accounts entirely and send you a check for the balance if there’s no legal hold on the funds. But if the balance includes PPP loan proceeds that the bank believes were obtained fraudulently, they might report the funds to the SBA or hold them pending federal investigation rather than returning them to you.
The second major consequence is that information about your loan and account activity gets transmitted to federal law enforcement agencies through FinCEN’s SAR database. Within days of your bank filing the report, FBI agents, SBA OIG investigators, and DOJ prosecutors can access detailed information about your suspicious transactions and the bank’s fraud allegations. This means an investigation can begin immediately without any additional steps required.
The SBA gets notified too, especialy if your lender reports the loan directly to the SBA rather than just filing a SAR with FinCEN. The SBA has an entire system for tracking potentially fraudulent PPP loans referred by lenders. According to the SBA OIG, the agency uses “hold code 50” to flag loans reported by lenders for suspected fraud. These flagged loans receive additional scrutiny during forgiveness review and post-forgiveness audits.
Your loan forgiveness application, if you haven’t submitted it yet, might get denied or placed on hold pending investigation. If you already received forgiveness, the SBA can revoke forgiveness and demand repayment if they determine the loan was obtained or used fraudulently. We’ve seen cases where clients had forgiveness approved, thought the matter was closed, and then received letters months later saying forgiveness was being revoked based on fraud findings and demanding immediate repayment of the full loan amount plus interest.
The lender might also report you to credit bureaus if they close your accounts or classify the PPP loan as fraudulent. This can destroy your credit score and make it impossible to open new bank accounts or obtain financing. We’ve had clients who couldn’t open checking accounts at other banks because there names appeared in banking databases as having accounts closed for suspected fraud.
Federal investigators start gathering additional evidence about your loan and business. They subpoena records from the IRS to get your tax returns and compare them to what you claimed on your PPP application. They pull your Social Security Administration records to verify employment history. They request information from state agencies about your business formation and unemployment insurance filings. They analyze public records to see if your business existed when you claimed it did. All of this background investigation happens quietly without you knowing about it.
In some cases, federal agents contact you directly shortly after the lender report. This happens when the suspected fraud is obvious and large enough that investigators want to interview you before you have time to prepare or hire counsel. We’ve had clients receive phone calls from FBI agents within two weeks of there banks freezing there accounts, asking to schedule interviews to “clear up some questions” about the PPP loan.
How Long After a Lender Report Until I’m Contacted by Investigators?
The timeline from when your lender reports your PPP loan to when federal investigators contact you varies enormously depending on numerous factors, and understanding the possible timelines helps you know whether your still at risk even if months have passed without contact.
In cases involving obvious fraud or large loan amounts, contact can happen quickly – within two to eight weeks after the lender report. If you got a $500,000 PPP loan for a business that didn’t exist and used the funds to buy luxury cars, federal agents aren’t going to wait long before contacting you. These high-priority cases get assigned to investigators immediately and they start working on them right away.
For moderate cases involving smaller loans or less obvious fraud indicators, the timeline is typically three to six months from the lender report to initial investigator contact. Federal agencies receive thousands of PPP fraud referrals and they have to prioritize which cases to investigate first. Loans under $150,000 with moderate red flags might sit in a queue for several months before an agent gets assigned to investigate.
Some investigations take even longer, with initial contact happening 12 to 24 months after the lender report. This extended timeline occurs when investigators are overloaded with cases, when your case is complex and requires extensive background investigation before approaching you, or when prosecutors are building cases against multiple people involved in related fraud schemes and waiting to contact everyone simultaneously.
We’ve also seen cases where lender reports never result in contact from investigators at all. Just because your bank filed a SAR doesn’t mean federal agents will definitely investigate and contact you. The sheer volume of PPP fraud reports far exceeds investigative resources, and many reports sit in databases without any active investigation. Small loans with minor suspicious activity might never be investigated even though they were reported.
However, the lack of contact doesn’t mean your safe. The statute of limitations for PPP fraud is 10 years under 18 U.S.C. § 3293, which means prosecutors can investigate and charge cases until 2030 or later for loans received in 2020 and 2021. Your lender might have reported your loan in 2021, and federal agents might not contact you until 2026 when they finally get to your case in the backlog.
The extended statute of limitations is deliberate. Congress gave prosecutors extra time specifically for PPP and EIDL fraud cases because they knew the volume of fraud was massive and it would take years to investigate all the cases. So don’t assume your in the clear just because it’s been two or three years since your bank reported your loan.
Sometimes the first “contact” isn’t a phone call or letter from investigators, it’s a grand jury subpoena demanding documents and testimony. Prosecutors might spend a year investigating your case through records review and witness interviews before they finally contact you with a subpoena compelling your cooperation. This means the investigation has been ongoing for a long time even though you weren’t aware of it.
Other times, the first contact is a search warrant executed at your home or business where federal agents show up unannounced to seize evidence. Search warrants mean prosecutors already convinced a federal judge there’s probable cause to believe you committed a crime, so the investigation is in advanced stages before you even knew it existed.
The worst scenario is when the first contact is your arrest. Some cases are investigated entirely without the target knowing, and prosecutors secure an indictment from a grand jury before approaching you. Then federal agents execute an arrest warrant and you find out about the investigation when your taken into custody. This happens when prosecutors are worried about flight risk or when they want the tactical advantage of surprise arrest.
What Should I Do If My Bank Freezes My Account or Reports My Loan?
If you discover your bank account has been frozen or you learn your lender reported your PPP loan to authorities, your actions in the next 48 hours are absolutely critical for protecting yourself against criminal prosecution. Making the wrong moves can turn a situation that might be resolved into a federal indictment.
The first and most important step is to contact a federal criminal defense attorney who specializes in PPP fraud cases immediately. Don’t wait to see what happens. Don’t think you can handle this yourself. Don’t try to talk to the bank to “clear up the misunderstanding.” Call us the same day you learn about the account freeze or lender report because the clock is ticking and we need to start protecting your rights and developing defense strategies right away.
Do NOT contact federal investigators if they’ve reached out to you. If FBI agents called asking to schedule an interview, do NOT call them back. If SBA OIG investigators left messages asking you to contact them, do NOT return those calls. If anyone from law enforcement wants to talk to you, your response should be: “I need to speak with my attorney before answering any questions. Please contact my lawyer.” Then immediately call us and we’ll handle all communication with investigators.
Do NOT talk to your bank about why the account was frozen or what you used the PPP funds for. Bank employees who investigate SARs and suspicious activity are required to report everything you tell them to federal authorities. Anything you say to the bank trying to explain or justify your transactions can be used against you in criminal prosecution. If the bank contacts you about the frozen account, simply acknowledge you received the notice and say you’ll be in contact through your attorney.
Do NOT make any statements to anyone about your PPP loan including business partners, accountants, employees, or family members. Everything you say to these people can be subpoenaed and used against you because conversations with them aren’t protected by attorney-client privilege. Only communications with your lawyer are confidential. We’ve had clients who discussed the account freeze with there business partner, and then prosecutors interviewed the partner who told investigators everything the client said, providing damaging admissions that were used to secure an indictment.
Do NOT destroy any documents or delete any files related to your PPP loan. If your account was frozen or your loan was reported, your already under investigation and destroying evidence is a federal crime called obstruction of justice under 18 U.S.C. § 1519. This statute carries up to 20 years in prison and prosecutors love charging obstruction because it’s often easier to prove than the underlying fraud. Preserve every email, text message, document, financial record, and file that relates to your business or PPP loan.
DO implement a litigation hold immediately to preserve all potentially relevant materials. Tell employees not to delete anything. Suspend automatic document deletion policies. Make backups of computer systems. Stop any regular document destruction procedures. Failing to preserve evidence after you know your under investigation can result in spoliation sanctions and obstruction charges even if you didn’t intentionally destroy specific documents.
DO gather and organize documents related to your PPP loan including your loan application and all supporting documentation, bank statements showing deposits and use of funds, tax returns for your business and personal finances, payroll records and employment documentation, correspondence with the lender or SBA, and loan forgiveness application materials. Having these documents organized when you meet with us allows us to assess the situation quickly and develop strategies.
DO write down a detailed timeline of everything related to your PPP loan while it’s fresh in your memory. When did you apply? Who helped prepare the application? What information did you provide? How did you calculate the loan amount? What did you use the funds for? When was your account frozen? What communications have you had with the bank or federal agents? This timeline is privileged when you provide it to your attorney and helps us understand your case.
DO NOT try to move money to other accounts or hide assets. If your account was frozen, attempting to move other assets looks like consciousness of guilt and can result in additional charges for concealing assets. Prosecutors can trace asset movements and they’ll argue your trying to hide money from seizure, which proves you knew you committed fraud.
DO contact us for an emergency consultation where we can assess the immediate risks, determine what your rights are, evaluate whether your account freeze can be challenged, develop a strategy for responding to investigators, and begin building your defense before charges are filed. The sooner we get involved, the better chance we have of preventing criminal prosecution or minimizing charges if prosecution is unavoidable.
Can I Challenge the Account Freeze or Lender Report?
Whether you can successfully challenge your bank account freeze or the lender’s report to authorities depends on the specific circumstances of your case and the evidence supporting the bank’s fraud allegations. Understanding the legal framework for challenging these actions helps set realistic expectations about what’s possible.
Bank account freezes related to suspected fraud are extremely difficult to overturn quickly. Banks have broad discretion to freeze accounts when they suspect illegal activity, and courts generally defer to banks’ judgment about suspicious transactions. The bank isn’t required to prove you committed fraud to freeze your account, they just need reasonable suspicion that the funds might be proceeds of fraud or that your using the account for illegal purposes.
You can file a lawsuit against the bank claiming wrongful freeze and demanding release of your funds, but these cases are very difficult to win and take months or years to resolve. The bank will argue they had legitimate reasons to suspect fraud based on your transaction patterns, and they’ll present evidence of the red flags that triggered there concerns. You’ll have to prove the bank acted in bad faith or without any reasonable basis for suspecting fraud, which is a high bar.
More importantly, challenging the freeze can backfire by drawing additional attention to your case and forcing you to make statements under oath about your PPP loan that could incriminate you. If you sue the bank, you’ll have to explain in court filings why the transactions weren’t fraudulent, and those explanations become evidence prosecutors can use against you. Discovery in the civil case might reveal information that helps prosecutors build there criminal case. And if you testify in the civil proceeding, prosecutors can use that testimony against you in the criminal case.
You cannot challenge or stop the lender’s Suspicious Activity Report itself. Once a SAR is filed with FinCEN, it’s done and there’s no legal mechanism for getting it removed or amended. You can’t sue the bank for filing a SAR because federal law provides immunity to financial institutions that file SARs in good faith. And you can’t demand that the bank tell you what’s in the SAR because banks are legally prohibited from disclosing that information.
However, you can sometimes work through your attorney to convince federal prosecutors that the lender’s fraud suspicions are wrong and no criminal investigation is warranted. We’ve successfully resolved cases where banks reported clients but we were able to demonstrate to DOJ attorneys that what looked like suspicious activity had legitimate explanations. If we can show that transactions the bank flagged were actually authorized uses of PPP funds, or that apparent discrepancies resulted from good faith mistakes rather than fraud, prosecutors might decline to pursue the case.
This proactive approach with prosecutors is much more effective than challenging the bank freeze in court. If we can convince the DOJ there’s no fraud, they’ll tell the bank to release the account and the matter ends. But this requires careful legal strategy because we’re essentially approaching prosecutors and saying “investigate our client,” which only makes sense when we’re confident we can demonstrate innocence or lack of criminal intent.
In some cases, we can negotiate partial release of frozen funds for living expenses or business operations while the investigation continues. If the account contains PPP funds plus other legitimate business money, we might convince the bank or prosecutors to release the non-PPP funds while holding the suspected fraudulent funds. This at least allows you to access some money to survive and operate your business while the investigation proceeds.
If federal agents have seized your funds through civil forfeiture procedures, you have the right to challenge the seizure and demand an adversarial hearing where the goverment must prove by a preponderance of evidence that the funds are proceeds of fraud. These forfeiture challenges can be successful, but they require proving your innocent of fraud which might require testimony and evidence that creates risks for any parallel criminal investigation.
The strategic decision about whether to challenge an account freeze or fight the lender’s report must be made carefully with full understanding of the risks and benefits. Sometimes the smart move is to accept the freeze, preserve your Fifth Amendment rights, and focus on preventing criminal charges rather than fighting to get the frozen funds released.
What Are My Rights During the Investigation?
Once your lender reports your PPP loan and federal investigators start working on your case, you have important constitutional rights that protect you from being forced to incriminate yourself. Understanding and properly exercising these rights is critical for avoiding additional charges and preserving your defenses.
Your Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination gives you the absolute right to refuse to answer questions if your answers would tend to incriminate you in a crime. This right applies whether your guilty or innocent, and invoking it cannot be used as evidence against you in a criminal trial. You can refuse to talk to federal investigators, decline interviews, and refuse to provide documents that would incriminate you.
However, the Fifth Amendment doesn’t protect you from having to produce documents that already exist. If prosecutors subpoena your bank records, tax returns, or business documents, you generally have to produce them even if they contain incriminating information. The privilege protects you from being forced to create new testimonial evidence, not from having to hand over existing records.
Your right to counsel under the Sixth Amendment means you have the right to have a lawyer represent you throughout the investigation and any proceedings that result. Once you invoke this right by stating “I want my lawyer present before answering any questions,” federal agents must stop questioning you. All further communication should go through your attorney.
Your Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable searches and seizures means federal agents need a warrant to search your home, business, or seize your property in most circumstances. If agents show up without a warrant, you don’t have to consent to a search and you should politely refuse and ask them to return with a warrant. If they have a warrant, you must allow the search but you should photograph the warrant, have your attorney review it, and ensure agents don’t exceed the scope of what the warrant authorizes.
You have the right to see any search warrant or seizure warrant before agents execute it. Ask to read the entire warrant including the attachments that describe what can be searched or seized. Federal warrants are often overly broad, and your attorney can sometimes challenge searches that exceed what the warrant actually authorized.
You have the right to remain silent during any questioning by federal agents. You don’t have to explain where you got money, how you used it, who you did business with, or anything else about your finances or activities. Silence isn’t evidence of guilt and can’t be used against you at trial in most circumstances.
However, you don’t have the right to lie to federal agents. As we’ve discussed repeatedly, making false statements to federal investigators is itself a crime under 18 U.S.C. § 1001. So your choice when questioned is to tell the truth, remain silent, or talk to your lawyer – never lie.
If your served with a grand jury subpoena, you have the right to be represented by counsel outside the grand jury room. You can’t have your lawyer in the grand jury room with you during testimony, but you can consult with your attorney before going in, and you can leave the room to consult with your lawyer before answering any question. We’ve had clients leave the grand jury room dozens of times during testimony to ask us whether they should answer specific questions or invoke the Fifth Amendment.
You have the right to challenge grand jury subpoenas that are overly burdensome, seek irrelevant information, or violate your privileges. We can file motions to quash or modify subpoenas, and sometimes we successfully narrow the scope of what you have to produce or testify about.
Attorney-client privilege protects all communications between you and your lawyer about your case. Federal agents can’t force you to disclose what you told your attorney or what legal advice you received. This privilege is critical for ensuring you can speak freely with us about your situation without fear that your statements will be used against you.
Work product protection shields documents your attorney prepares in anticipation of litigation from disclosure. Notes we take during meetings, legal research we conduct, and strategy memoranda we write are protected from subpoena and can’t be seized during searches.
These rights only protect you if you exercise them properly. If you waive your rights by voluntarily talking to investigators without counsel, making statements, or consenting to searches, you lose the protections. That’s why getting experienced legal representation immediately when you learn your under investigation is so critical – we ensure your rights are preserved and properly invoked throughout the investigation.
Why You Need Our Firm When Your Lender Reports Your Loan
When your bank or lender reports your PPP loan to federal authorities, your facing one of the most serious situations possible short of actual criminal charges. The decisions you make in the next few days will determine whether you end up convicted of federal fraud crimes or whether this investigation gets resolved without prosecution. You cannot afford to handle this without specialized legal counsel who knows exactly how to navigate PPP fraud investigations.
Our firm has extensive experience representing clients whose PPP loans were reported by lenders, and we know how these investigations work from initial SAR filing through final resolution. We know what federal prosecutors look for, what evidence they need to bring charges, and what strategies work to prevent prosecution or minimize charges if they can’t be avoided.
When you hire us immediately after learning your loan was reported, we take several critical actions to protect you. We contact the federal prosecutors and agents who received the lender report to determine the status of the investigation and what evidence they’re considering. We conduct our own investigation of your PPP loan to identify problems before prosecutors do and develop explanations or defenses. We gather exculpatory evidence showing good faith or lack of criminal intent. We prepare proactive presentations to prosecutors demonstrating why charges aren’t warranted.
We protect your constitutional rights throughout the investigation by ensuring you don’t make incriminating statements to investigators, properly invoking the Fifth Amendment when appropriate, preventing illegal searches or seizures, and shielding privileged communications from disclosure. We handle all contact with federal agents so you don’t have to face interrogation tactics or pressure to cooperate without protection.
We work to unfreeze your bank accounts when possible by negotiating with banks and federal authorities, demonstrating that frozen funds aren’t proceeds of fraud, or arranging for partial release of funds for living expenses and business operations. While we can’t guarantee account releases, we’ve successfully convinced banks and prosecutors to release frozen funds in numerous cases.
We evaluate whether cooperation strategies make sense for your situation and if so, we negotiate proffer agreements and cooperation deals that provide maximum protection. We prepare you thoroughly before any proffer sessions or interviews to ensure you don’t make false statements or unnecessary admissions. And we’re present during all cooperation sessions to protect your interests.
Throughout the investigation, we’re analyzing the goverment’s evidence and building your defense. We identify weaknesses in the prosecution’s case, develop legal and factual defenses, gather evidence supporting your innocence or mitigating your culpability, and prepare for potential trial if charges can’t be avoided.
If charges are inevitable, we negotiate the possible plea agreements with reduced charges, favorable sentencing recommendations, and credit for cooperation if appropriate. We fight to keep you out of prison and minimize financial penalties and restitution obligations.
The cost of hiring experienced federal defense counsel immediately when your loan is reported is minimal compared to the potential consequences you face. PPP fraud convictions result in years in federal prison, hundreds of thousands or millions in restitution, massive fines, and permanent criminal records that destroy careers and opportunities. Investing in proper legal representation when the investigation first begins can save you from these catastrophic outcomes.
Lender reported your PPP loan? Account frozen?
Don’t panic – Call us immediately!
Early representation can prevent criminal charges
Having your lender report your PPP loan to federal authorities is a serious situation that requires immediate legal action. Don’t try to handle this yourself. Don’t wait to see what happens. And don’t talk to investigators without a lawyer present. Contact our firm today for an emergency consultation and let us start protecting your rights, your freedom, and your future right now while there’s still time to prevent the worst outcomes.