Posted on 01/21/2023 9:13:29 AM PST by Deadeye Division
CINCINNATI (WXIX) - A Cincinnati woman impersonated her own mother for nearly half a century in a successful effort to steal nearly half a million dollars from the federal government, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.
Irene Ferrin, who is now 76, impersonated her dead mother on several occasions and once lied to a U.S. Bankruptcy Court to help hide her scheme, according Special Assistant U.S. Attorney Timothy Landry.
Ferrin pleaded guilty on Aug. 11, 2022.
U.S. District Court Judge Douglas Cole on Thursday sentenced 76-year-old Irene Ferrin to five years of probation including one year of home detention. Ferrin must also repay the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs what she stole, currently valued at $461,780.
Arguing for a prison sentence even at her late stage in life, Landry said Ferrin’s age “is more like an aggravating factor than a mitigating factor” considering the duration of the crime.
He also equated stealing from the VA to stealing from veterans, saying she “callously exploited her own mother’s death” to steal from a government program “designed to help those who have served their country.”
Ferrin’s mother was receiving widow’s and dependency benefits from the VA when she died in 1973, according to the DOJ. The benefits should have ceased upon her death, but no one—including Ferrin, who was 26 years old at the time—notified the VA. The paper checks kept coming, and Ferrin endorsed them by forging her mother’s signature.
The government’s sentencing memorandum begins: “In 1973, a gallon of gas was 39 cents, ‘The Godfather’ won an Oscar, fax machines were an emerging form of technology, and the defendant, Irene Ferrin, was beginning an ongoing theft from the military veterans of this country that would last nearly half a century.”
The monthly checks started at $250 in 1974. The last check she received before the VA caught her was for $1,357.60.
Ferrin received more than 500 checks in total and several times submitted fraudulent paperwork to the VA to keep the scheme alive.
“Clearly this was not a one-time lapse in judgement,” Landry said. “[...]She could have stopped any time, but each month she decided to continue stealing the money. Similarly, each time the defendant submitted forged paperwork to the VA, she reaffirmed her decision to continue stealing.”
The memo acknowledges when the scheme began, Ferrin’s parents were dead and she had several adolescent siblings to support as well as her own children, two with her first husband and one with her second.
“Although this may explain (though not excuse) her decision to take the VA benefits for a short time in the early 1970′s, it does not remotely begin to justify her subsequent theft from the VA for the ensuing four decades,” Landry said.
A forged letter she sent the VA in 1982 claimed her mother had recently moved and sought a change of address.
In a 1984 letter sent to the VA, Ferrin, writing now on her own behalf, said, “Sometimes my mother has trouble remembering where all her information is located, so I will do my best to get it all put together for her.”
In 2017, Ferrin forged her mother’s signature on a form directing the VA to deposit the benefits into a bank account she controlled.
Ferrin filed for bankruptcy in 2019 claiming falsely she had no income.
Ultimately, Ferrin received the five years of probation her defense requested. The sentencing memorandum on her behalf notes she has no criminal history and “provides around-the-clock care for
her 80-year-old husband,” who has a degenerative neuromuscular condition.
The defense also noted Ferrin in 1971 married a man, whom she later divorced, but who would become abusive during their marriage. She had six children to raise, including her siblings, whom the rest of her family allegedly wanted to place into foster care. Moreover, she says it was her then-husband who told her to continue to cash the VA checks.
“Irene, overwhelmed beyond measure and with no one safe or trustworthy to turn to for support or advice, did just that. She knew that she should have informed the VA of her mother’s death, but she did not understand that the payments were not also for her three minor siblings, she needed the money to keep all of her now-six kids fed and housed and together, and [her husband] had been controlling her since their relationship started,” the memorandum reads, later adding that she “spent nearly an entire decade being abused and controlled by men who had promised to love and protect her[...]”
The man to whom Irene is currently married was Ferrin’s first husband, whom she married at 18 and divorced at 23 after producing two children. They rekindled their relationship following Ferrin’s second divorce and have been married ever since—45 years.
She says she never told him of the VA theft scheme out of fear and shame.
When federal agents showed up at Ferrin’s door, per the memo, “Irene was truthful, cooperative, and immediately took responsibility for her crime.”
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“major purpose of any government was to redistribute wealth”
Your neighbor is correct—for most of human history that is exactly what governments have done—stolen from the peons to enrich the plutocrats.
Our Founding Fathers had a different vision—but it was a truly revolutionary one—and it is not surprising that it could not last long.
So I’m not reading where the article says how old the mother was when she died over 50 years ago. But it’s very safe to assume the VA kept sending out checks to a person who would easily be well over 100 even 110 years old.
Are there no safeguards at all? Is there not any checks and balances available to do follow ups?
“Ferrin must also repay the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs what she stole, currently valued at $461,780.”
Gosh, if she doesn’t pay anything, they might extend her non-punishment. This is a real deterent to other grifters.
More on the goobermint than her, imho.
Or she could move to San Francisco and claim she has black slave ancestors. The state will reward her $2 million. /spit
Yup
Slap in the face of justice, old woman card played
President Harrison Bounell?
The federal government robs us continuously, and here they pretend to take the moral high ground against someone who gives it back to them?
FWIW, she did wrong. Not saying she didn’t.
But the hypocrisy is staggering.
I would think there are many thousands—perhaps even millions—of cases like these for Veterans or Social Security fraud—that are still not known.
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I agree, especially since I have reported on 3 cases that I knew of personally. (Same perps in one of the cases)
All those dates and numbers and far as I can tell there is not enough information to tell how old her mother would have to be if she were still alive. They tell you when the mother died but not how old she was when she died.
Since you mention Obama......he and Michelle had several SS numbers, according to “The Obama Timeline”.
You are right, they probably won’t, but the bankruptcy court might.
Steaks a half million and gets a slap on the wrist for it because she’s “old”. I’m old too.... older than she is.
Nut I’m not a thief.
“But not nut
You think thats all the VA fraud? Did you know that in a common law state a woman can claim spouse death benefits by having people say she was presented as common law spouse by man while alive. When I first moved to Alabama I introduced myself to my neighbor who was an elderly white guy at least in his late 70s, in a wheelchair, and as I lated found out was dying soon of heart related problems which he received service related disability. He then introduced me to his “wife” who to my surprise was a fairly attractive young (around 30) black female who just happened to be wearing an all white pants suit like a nurse or CNA would wear. A few months later he is in the ground, the house was sold by his wife who was no doubt now entitled to spouse benefits for life from her “husband” who had received professional 24 hour home care at little or no cost to him, but hundreds of thousands of dollars will be paid over the 40-50 years to the “wife” in a sham marriage. Don’t think for a minute that this is not still happening.
Nobody thought that the lady would be getting old and be pass the normal age of death? If the person who died was 45 for instance, they didn’t think of see if it she was alive within the 50 years? And if the lady died at 65, you meant idiots would think, the lady is 115, we need to see if she is still alive.
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