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The slightly belated news came from Philadelphia that on September 19, federal judge Kelly Brisbonne Hodge sentenced 60-year-old Oksana Credence to 20 months in prison and three years of supervision upon release.
In addition, Credence must return $66,869 in illicit enrichment, as well as pay two fines in the amount of $81,000 and $10,000 plus $100 in legal costs.
Last October, Credence pleaded guilty to allegedly conspiring with several companies to provide personal home assistance services to federal Medicaid recipients in Philadelphia and other counties in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. Although Medicaid was billed for personal assistance services, in reality these services were not provided for some recipients. Instead, Oksana Credence negotiated with recipients to pay them in cash instead of providing care.
I will immediately make a reservation that the ethnic origin of Oksana Kredens is not indicated in the case materials, but her marital status: husband Valery, children Ilona and Svyatoslav, relatives Valentina, Volodymyr, Oksana and Tatayana (all Kredens), as well as employees and acquaintances Andriy Moskalyuk, Natalia, Roza, Oleg and Yan Lifshitz, Bohdan Kuchma, Roman Zadorozhny, George Barnabishvili and Aliksander Vanukevich, speak for themselves. The indictment states that Oksana Credence recruited people for fictitious work in companies that allegedly provided home care. Such a company issued invoices to the Medicaid program and received payment for fictitious services that were allegedly provided by fictitious employees, and instead of services, program customers received money. There was nothing new in this scam, except, perhaps, that the workers hired by Oksana Credence received a salary, part of which was given to her, and she paid off this money to Medicaid customers, and kept the rest for herself.
"Stealing Medicaid money is straining the system and deceiving the taxpayers who fund it", said U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania Jacqueline Romero. - This sentence makes Oksana Credence responsible for her criminal acts. Health care fraud costs our country billions of dollars every year, and my prosecutor's office and our partners are working hard to fight this scourge." The partners in this case were the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Office of the Inspector General of the Ministry of Health.
Another case involving two Ukrainians became known from Miami, where on September 24, 39-year-old Oleg Olynyk and 41-year-old Oleksandr Yurchik were charged in federal court in the Southern District of Florida, who were extradited to the United States the day before from Thailand, where they were arrested on April 19, 2022 in the city of Phuket. Then it was reported that both citizens of Ukraine were detained on a warrant of a US court, where they are accused of providing asylum to illegal migrants, money laundering and tax evasion. The indictment, which a federal grand jury found sufficient to go to trial, alleges that from August 2007 to July 2021, Olynyk, Jurczyk, and their co-conspirators, who legally reside in South Florida, opened employment companies, including those in the case of Paradise Choice LLC, Paradise Choice Cleaning LLC, Tropical City Services LLC, and Tropical City Group LLC. not who had the right to do so, which is considered a crime under federal law. In addition, the prosecution alleges, Olynyk and Yurczyk deceived the IRS by not withholding money from the salaries of illegal immigrants for social security, health care and income tax. They also prepared and filed false corporate tax returns for their companies with the IRS.
And there is nothing fundamentally new in this scam, although among immigrants from the republics of the former USSR such "labor exchanges" are much rarer than, say, among Latin Americans. The charges threaten Oleg Olynyk and Oleksandr Yurchik with imprisonment for up to 35 years, but this is in the case of article-by-article addition (5 + 10 + 20) and no admission of guilt, which usually does not happen. Until the court's decision, both are presumed innocent, but are still in custody, although they are not in the database of the Federal Bureau of Prisons. The federal prosecutor of the Southern District of Florida, Markenzie Lapointe, is still silent, but he could, as usually happens in such cases, speak out about the long arm of our justice, which will reach the defendant, wherever he hides.
And finally, let me remind you that on September 5, a federal grand jury in Marylnda found that six Russian hackers had been convicted of conspiracy to commit computer hacking and fraud. The five accused officers are officers of the Russian military intelligence GRU - the commander of the military unit No 29155 - the cyber operations department, Colonel Yuri Denisov, and four lieutenants of his department - Vladislav Borovkov, Denis Denisenko, Dmitry Goloshubov and Nikolai Korchagin. The sixth defendant is Russian citizen Amin Stigal. The preliminary indictment alleges that in the run-up to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the six intended to hack into websites associated with the Ukrainian government in Kyiv in order to "sow concern among Ukrainian citizens about the security of their government systems and personal data".
A press release from the Maryland federal prosecutor's office said that the GRU hackers wanted to obtain data from the Ukrainian government that had no military or defense significance. In addition, the computer systems of countries providing support to Ukraine, including the United States and 25 other NATO states, were targeted. The campaign was called WhisperGate - after the name of malicious software that hackers distributed using the services of a certain American company. It is a cyber weapon designed to completely destroy the target computer and its associated data" in the run-up to the Russian invasion of Ukraine". It is alleged that with the help of this software in January 2022, the websites of the government of Ukraine, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Sports, the Ministry of Energy, the Ministry of Agrarian Policy, the Ministry of Veterans' Affairs, as well as the websites of the State Treasury and public services were attacked.
"Since July 2021, the State Department's Rewards for Justice (RFJ) program, administered by the Diplomatic Security Service (DSS)", said Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Investigation and Threat Analysis Paul Houston, "has been offering a reward of up to $10 million for information leading to the identification or location of any person who, acting at the direction or under the control of a foreign government, participates in certain malicious cyber activities against U.S. critical infrastructure in violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. As part of this reward offer, the RFJ program is looking for information leading to the whereabouts of these individuals, malicious cyber activity of the Russian GRU or related individuals and entities". Of course, it is wisely said, but for the sake of such a goal and for such money, you can be smart.
The prosecution will be represented in court by assistant federal prosecutors Aron Zelinsky and Robert Goldaris. Earlier, presumably, Russian hackers broke into the entrance to the Kyrgyz channel "AlmaTV" and showed videos with Putin. In June 2024, a Pakistani hacker group leaked the personal data of Kyrgyz citizens. In August, US presidential candidate Republican Donald Trump announced the hacking of his campaign headquarters' email. Trump believed that the hacker attack was organized by the Iranian government. Iran denied these claims, saying the government "has no purpose or motive to interfere in the U.S. presidential election." Such are the criminal-political affairs in cyberspace.
In addition, Credence must return $66,869 in illicit enrichment, as well as pay two fines in the amount of $81,000 and $10,000 plus $100 in legal costs.
Last October, Credence pleaded guilty to allegedly conspiring with several companies to provide personal home assistance services to federal Medicaid recipients in Philadelphia and other counties in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. Although Medicaid was billed for personal assistance services, in reality these services were not provided for some recipients. Instead, Oksana Credence negotiated with recipients to pay them in cash instead of providing care.
I will immediately make a reservation that the ethnic origin of Oksana Kredens is not indicated in the case materials, but her marital status: husband Valery, children Ilona and Svyatoslav, relatives Valentina, Volodymyr, Oksana and Tatayana (all Kredens), as well as employees and acquaintances Andriy Moskalyuk, Natalia, Roza, Oleg and Yan Lifshitz, Bohdan Kuchma, Roman Zadorozhny, George Barnabishvili and Aliksander Vanukevich, speak for themselves. The indictment states that Oksana Credence recruited people for fictitious work in companies that allegedly provided home care. Such a company issued invoices to the Medicaid program and received payment for fictitious services that were allegedly provided by fictitious employees, and instead of services, program customers received money. There was nothing new in this scam, except, perhaps, that the workers hired by Oksana Credence received a salary, part of which was given to her, and she paid off this money to Medicaid customers, and kept the rest for herself.
"Stealing Medicaid money is straining the system and deceiving the taxpayers who fund it", said U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania Jacqueline Romero. - This sentence makes Oksana Credence responsible for her criminal acts. Health care fraud costs our country billions of dollars every year, and my prosecutor's office and our partners are working hard to fight this scourge." The partners in this case were the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Office of the Inspector General of the Ministry of Health.
Another case involving two Ukrainians became known from Miami, where on September 24, 39-year-old Oleg Olynyk and 41-year-old Oleksandr Yurchik were charged in federal court in the Southern District of Florida, who were extradited to the United States the day before from Thailand, where they were arrested on April 19, 2022 in the city of Phuket. Then it was reported that both citizens of Ukraine were detained on a warrant of a US court, where they are accused of providing asylum to illegal migrants, money laundering and tax evasion. The indictment, which a federal grand jury found sufficient to go to trial, alleges that from August 2007 to July 2021, Olynyk, Jurczyk, and their co-conspirators, who legally reside in South Florida, opened employment companies, including those in the case of Paradise Choice LLC, Paradise Choice Cleaning LLC, Tropical City Services LLC, and Tropical City Group LLC. not who had the right to do so, which is considered a crime under federal law. In addition, the prosecution alleges, Olynyk and Yurczyk deceived the IRS by not withholding money from the salaries of illegal immigrants for social security, health care and income tax. They also prepared and filed false corporate tax returns for their companies with the IRS.
And there is nothing fundamentally new in this scam, although among immigrants from the republics of the former USSR such "labor exchanges" are much rarer than, say, among Latin Americans. The charges threaten Oleg Olynyk and Oleksandr Yurchik with imprisonment for up to 35 years, but this is in the case of article-by-article addition (5 + 10 + 20) and no admission of guilt, which usually does not happen. Until the court's decision, both are presumed innocent, but are still in custody, although they are not in the database of the Federal Bureau of Prisons. The federal prosecutor of the Southern District of Florida, Markenzie Lapointe, is still silent, but he could, as usually happens in such cases, speak out about the long arm of our justice, which will reach the defendant, wherever he hides.
And finally, let me remind you that on September 5, a federal grand jury in Marylnda found that six Russian hackers had been convicted of conspiracy to commit computer hacking and fraud. The five accused officers are officers of the Russian military intelligence GRU - the commander of the military unit No 29155 - the cyber operations department, Colonel Yuri Denisov, and four lieutenants of his department - Vladislav Borovkov, Denis Denisenko, Dmitry Goloshubov and Nikolai Korchagin. The sixth defendant is Russian citizen Amin Stigal. The preliminary indictment alleges that in the run-up to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the six intended to hack into websites associated with the Ukrainian government in Kyiv in order to "sow concern among Ukrainian citizens about the security of their government systems and personal data".
A press release from the Maryland federal prosecutor's office said that the GRU hackers wanted to obtain data from the Ukrainian government that had no military or defense significance. In addition, the computer systems of countries providing support to Ukraine, including the United States and 25 other NATO states, were targeted. The campaign was called WhisperGate - after the name of malicious software that hackers distributed using the services of a certain American company. It is a cyber weapon designed to completely destroy the target computer and its associated data" in the run-up to the Russian invasion of Ukraine". It is alleged that with the help of this software in January 2022, the websites of the government of Ukraine, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Sports, the Ministry of Energy, the Ministry of Agrarian Policy, the Ministry of Veterans' Affairs, as well as the websites of the State Treasury and public services were attacked.
"Since July 2021, the State Department's Rewards for Justice (RFJ) program, administered by the Diplomatic Security Service (DSS)", said Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Investigation and Threat Analysis Paul Houston, "has been offering a reward of up to $10 million for information leading to the identification or location of any person who, acting at the direction or under the control of a foreign government, participates in certain malicious cyber activities against U.S. critical infrastructure in violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. As part of this reward offer, the RFJ program is looking for information leading to the whereabouts of these individuals, malicious cyber activity of the Russian GRU or related individuals and entities". Of course, it is wisely said, but for the sake of such a goal and for such money, you can be smart.
The prosecution will be represented in court by assistant federal prosecutors Aron Zelinsky and Robert Goldaris. Earlier, presumably, Russian hackers broke into the entrance to the Kyrgyz channel "AlmaTV" and showed videos with Putin. In June 2024, a Pakistani hacker group leaked the personal data of Kyrgyz citizens. In August, US presidential candidate Republican Donald Trump announced the hacking of his campaign headquarters' email. Trump believed that the hacker attack was organized by the Iranian government. Iran denied these claims, saying the government "has no purpose or motive to interfere in the U.S. presidential election." Such are the criminal-political affairs in cyberspace.
