Louisiana man sentenced to 18 years for laundering $4.4 million in fake ERC checks
Damian R. Raby of Gonzales, Louisiana filed Employee Retention Credit claims for dozens of businesses in the Baton Rouge area that either did not exist during the pandemic or had no legitimate activity before it, causing the IRS to issue more than 30 checks totaling approximately $4.4 million. He was sentenced in November 2025 to 216 months (18 years) in federal prison after also obstructing the investigation into his conduct, and ordered to pay over $2.6 million in restitution.
- Year
- 2025
- Where
- United States
- Outcome
- Sentenced
- Reported loss
- $4.4 million
- Victims
- Not stated in the sources
- Schemes
- Employee Retention Credit (ERC) mill scams
- Last reviewed
- 2026-09-22
The facts, as recorded
- Raby obtained Employer Identification Numbers and opened bank accounts for businesses that either did not exist during the COVID-19 pandemic or had no legitimate business activity before it, then filed tax forms falsely claiming those businesses' employee counts and payroll to claim Employee Retention Credit refunds.
- The scheme caused the IRS to issue more than 30 checks to Raby's fraudulent businesses totaling approximately $4.4 million.
- Raby moved the proceeds quickly among multiple bank accounts he controlled to conceal their source, then spent them on luxury vehicles, his home mortgage, and other large purchases.
- After learning of the investigation, Raby made false statements to an IRS agent, sent fictitious documents to the IRS, and encouraged a witness to give false information, conduct charged separately as obstruction.
- U.S. District Judge John W. deGravelles sentenced Raby on 13 November 2025 to 216 months in federal prison, three years of supervised release, $2,603,678.04 in restitution to the U.S. Treasury, and forfeiture of $2,045,241.58.
- The United States separately seized more than $600,000 from bank accounts Raby controlled and forfeited a single-family residence in Gonzales, Louisiana purchased largely with fraudulent proceeds.
- A co-defendant, Kenyall Williams of Baton Rouge, was convicted of conspiracy to commit mail fraud and unlawful monetary transactions for assisting Raby's scheme in exchange for a share of the proceeds, and was sentenced to three years of probation and over $555,000 in restitution.
- U.S. Attorney Kurt Wall: "My office has emphasized that efforts to prosecute COVID-19-related fraud are critical to maintaining the integrity of government relief programs."
Why this case matters
Of the cases on this page, this is the longest sentence and the most self-contained: one man, dozens of fictitious businesses, and a scheme built entirely on paperwork the government never should have accepted in the first place. It shows how far an ERC mill can go when there is no real business behind the claim at all.
Businesses that existed only on the application
Raby did not exaggerate a real company’s eligibility; he obtained Employer Identification Numbers and bank accounts for businesses that, according to his own guilty plea, either did not exist during the pandemic or had no legitimate activity before it. The fraud was the business itself, not just the tax claim filed on its behalf.
Getting caught did not stop the scheme
After Raby learned investigators were looking into his conduct, he lied to an IRS agent, sent fabricated documents to the agency, and pushed a witness to do the same, conduct that added an obstruction conviction on top of the underlying fraud and money laundering, and is reflected in the length of his sentence.
The caveat
This is a concluded case. Raby pleaded guilty and was sentenced by a federal judge; the facts above come from the IRS’s own published account of his admissions and the court’s sentence, not unproven allegations.
People named in the public record
- Damian R. Raby · convicted
Sources
- Gonzales man sentenced to 18 years in federal prison for multimillion-dollar scheme to defraud the COVID-19-era employee retention credit program. US Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation. Accessed 2026-09-22. Supports: The fraudulent business scheme, the $4.4 million in checks, the money laundering and obstruction conduct, the sentence, restitution and forfeiture figures, the co-defendant's outcome, and the U.S. Attorney quote.