Carmine Agnello, grandson of the late John Gotti, has been sentenced to 15 months in prison for his role in a Covid-19 relief funds scam, in which he fraudulently obtained $1.1 million from the US government's Small Business Administration, according to the Department of Justice. The funds were then used for personal gain, including investments in cryptocurrency, with approximately $420,000 going towards a crypto business. Agnello submitted false information to the SBA between April 2020 and November 2021, claiming the funds were for his autoparts and recycling business in Queens.
The US Attorney's office stated that Agnello 'diverted the proceeds for his personal use', and he is required to repay the funds as part of his sentence. The case is not an isolated incident, as numerous individuals have been found guilty of defrauding the government's Covid relief fund, with statistics from the US Government Accountability Office suggesting that up to 15% of the total funds were lost to scams, amounting to roughly $135 billion. Agnello's grandfather, John Gotti, was a notorious figure who ran the Gambino crime family, earning an estimated $500 million annually from various illicit activities, before being found guilty on 13 criminal counts and dying in federal prison in 2002.