A high-ranking official in the D.C. office that investigates fraud and waste has been charged with fraud herself in an elaborate scheme to hire a former baby sitter into the agency. Deputy Assistant Inspector General Cheryl L. Ferrara was charged with mail fraud, making a false statement, aiding and abetting, and fraud in the second degree. Ferrara was charged last week, and court documents were made public Tuesday.
Ferrara, who worked in the Audit Division of the Office of the Inspector General, was also the treasurer of the Association of Inspectors General, a national organization founded, according to its mission statement, to “promote public accountability and integrity” in the prevention and prosecution of “fraud, waste, and abuse.”
Prosecutors said Ferrara used her positions at both organizations to falsify documents and move money so that her friend, Anurak Duangphut, could claim a D.C. residency so she could better qualify for a staff assistant job under Ferrara. Duangphut, 30, lived in Silver Spring.
Ferrara did not quickly return a phone message Tuesday seeking comment.
Prosecutors said Ferrara told Duangphut about the job and informed Duangphut that she needed to show residency and to show payment of rent.
Ferrara allegedly created a sample lease and suggested the name of a business associate for the purported landlord. Duangphut falsely wrote that she lived at an address in Northwest Washington, documents said.
Initially, the government rejected Duangphut’s lease as proof of residency. To make it look authentic, Ferrara placed a false notarization on the lease by copying a notary seal from another document and changing the date when it was signed, prosecutors said.
To show rent payments, Ferrara and Duangphut opened a bank account in D.C. for Duangphut so Duangphut could write checks to the landlord, documents said.
Duangphut didn’t earn enough money, so Ferrara allegedly took several thousand dollars from her personal account and from the Association of Inspectors General’s bank account. Duangphut wrote four checks for monthly rent to the bogus landlord, which Ferrara deposited into association account, prosecutors said.
Ferrara and other managers interviewed a number of qualified candidates for the job. Duangphut was hired instead, and she went to work for Ferrara, documents said.
Duangphut then rented a mail box to have her government paycheck stubs forwarded from her fake address, documents said. Ferrara recommended that Duangphut open a post office box near the Inspector General’s Office.
The plot unraveled in 2009, prosecutors said, after Duangphut told her employers that she had moved to a different District address.
Duangphut’s actions raised red flags, prosecutors said, and the investigation moved quickly from that point.
Duangphut has pleaded guilty to making false statements.
