Unemployment insurance fraud?

[SilentDreamer]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Nebraska

My fiance just got a thing in the mail yesterday saying that he has a warrant for his arrest for unemployment insurance fraud. He is planning on going to the courthouse tomorrow to try to work things out. Apparently he missed a court date for this last year, he didn't know about the court date. I am wondering what is going to happen. He is obviously going to plead not guilty so he can get a lawyer, but what is going to happen from there?

 

[cbg]

Sorry, the crystal ball is out being repaired.

Seriously, how could we possibly know what will happen next? We have no idea what triggered this, what he did or didn't do that the state is calling fraud, whether whoever he talks to in the courthouse will or will not pay attention to him, or any of a thousand other variable details.

 

[Zigner]

I do feel pretty darn confident in saying that your BF *did*, in fact, know about the court date that he missed

 

[dave33]

After he pleads, the judge will rule on the issue of bail. The judge will take several things into consideration to determine this. Bring some money. goodluck.

 

[commentator]

I'm not sure, but don't believe he can plead "not guilty" to having committed unemployment insurance fraud by going down to the courthouse. In this circumstance, it seems that the issue is that of not showing up for a court date.

The agency determined he was guilty of unemployment insurance fraud long ago; they're wanting the state to punish him based on this investigation. It took place long long ago, sometime long before they ever took out this warrant. The fraud unit of the unemployment office began to try to contact this person and ask him about and examine the circumstances under which they had reason to believe he had received unemployment insurance for weeks he was not eligible.

They did notify him, repeatedly, they did try to get his "not guilty" reasoning, and eventually, after he must have ignored many efforts to contact him, or lost his appeals, or was determined to be guilty based on their examination with his cooperation, they issued a decision finding him overpaid by such and such amount of money. They would have sent him a lot of notice of this, too.

This may have been more than simple or unintentional fraud, as they rarely press charges unless you have done a bit more than simply forgot to report that first week you went back to work. Using someone else's ss# or some other deliberate scam is usually involved.

It also isn't a good idea to ignore their requests for you to contact them or provide information. This could lead to prosecution even if it was not deliberate criminal fraud.

They'll probably want to go forward with the prosecution. The question is where he'll be until they get another court date set up.

 

[dave33]

Just my opinion here. He will have to go to the court house and plead if it is a criminal charge. The fraud unit may very well put together a case, but he still has the right to due process. They probably did try to notify him,and maybe get some sort of repayment, but after they got no reply they included the criminal justice system. If, this is his first appearance, than he will get arraigned. Although, if he has already been arraigned on fraud and given a court date and failed to showup than that is another situation. So, even if he was found guilty in absentia (civil) sounds like his lack of cooperation has pretty much forced their hand to upgrade the situation to the criminal division. Although there is so little information in the original thread it is hard to tell.