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In February 2017, Awan and some of his relatives were being investigated for allegedly stealing equipment from the House Democrats and violating the House IT network rules.<ref name="still employed">{{cite web |last=Caygle |first=Heather |url=http://www.politico.com/story/2017/02/house-staff-criminal-investigation-234714 |title=House staffers under criminal investigation still employed |publisher=[[Politico]] |work=Politico |date=February 6, 2017 |accessdate=July 27, 2017}}</ref><ref name=NYT /> After this investigation was revealed, Awan lost access to the House computer network, and most of his employers dismissed him and other House staffers involved in the case, including Awan's relatives.<ref name=NYT /> [[Debbie Wasserman Schultz]], however, continued to employ Awan in an advisory role.<ref name=NYT /><ref name="still employed"/><ref name="kept paying">{{cite web |last1=Daugherty |first1=Alex |last2=Sherman |first2=Amy |url=http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/article163818253.html |title=Wasserman Schultz kept paying tech expert suspected of stealing House computers |publisher=[[The McClatchy Company]] |work=[[Miami Herald]] |date=July 26, 2017 |accessdate=July 27, 2017}}</ref>
In February 2017, Awan and some of his relatives were being investigated for allegedly stealing equipment from the House Democrats and violating the House IT network rules.<ref name="still employed">{{cite web |last=Caygle |first=Heather |url=http://www.politico.com/story/2017/02/house-staff-criminal-investigation-234714 |title=House staffers under criminal investigation still employed |publisher=[[Politico]] |work=Politico |date=February 6, 2017 |accessdate=July 27, 2017}}</ref><ref name=NYT /> After this investigation was revealed, Awan lost access to the House computer network, and most of his employers dismissed him and other House staffers involved in the case, including Awan's relatives.<ref name=NYT /> [[Debbie Wasserman Schultz]], however, continued to employ Awan in an advisory role.<ref name=NYT /><ref name="still employed"/><ref name="kept paying">{{cite web |last1=Daugherty |first1=Alex |last2=Sherman |first2=Amy |url=http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/article163818253.html |title=Wasserman Schultz kept paying tech expert suspected of stealing House computers |publisher=[[The McClatchy Company]] |work=[[Miami Herald]] |date=July 26, 2017 |accessdate=July 27, 2017}}</ref>


On March 5, 2017, FBI (along with the Capitol Police) got to Dulles Airport to stop Awan's wife, Hina Alvi, before she embarked. It was discovered that she was carrying $12,400 in cash. But they allowed Awan's wife and their three children to fly to [[Lahore]].<ref>http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/449860/hina-alvi-imran-awan-debbie-wasserman-shultz-it-staffers-attempts-fled-country</ref><ref name=NYT /><ref name="WaPo staffer charged">{{cite web |last=Hsu |first=Spencer S. |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/public-safety/congressional-it-staffer-charged-with-home-equity-loan-fraud/2017/07/26/f5f402e8-71a7-11e7-9eac-d56bd5568db8_story.html |title=Congressional IT staffer charged with home equity loan fraud |publisher=[[Jeff Bezos#The Washington Post|Nash Holdings LLC]] |work=[[The Washington Post]] |date=July 26, 2017 |accessdate=July 28, 2017}}</ref> Awan's lawyer [[Chris Gowen]] said, "Mr. Awan's family is presently staying with extended family in Pakistan because he and his wife were both abruptly and unjustly fired, leaving them without a reliable source of income to pay typical U.S. living expenses, and because [[Far-right politics|extremist right-wing]] bloggers were beginning to harass them and their children."<ref name=NYT /><ref name="kept paying"/>
On March 5, 2017, the FBI along with the Capitol Police got to Dulles Airport stopped Awan's wife, Hina Alvi, before she embarked. Despite discovering $12,400 in undeclared cash that she was carrying, they allowed her and their three children to fly to [[Lahore]]. There has been no explanation why she was even allowed to leave, since carrying more than $10,000 out of the country without reporting it is a [[felony]].<ref name="GiraldiAugst3" /><ref>http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/449860/hina-alvi-imran-awan-debbie-wasserman-shultz-it-staffers-attempts-fled-country</ref><ref name=NYT /><ref name="WaPo staffer charged">{{cite web |last=Hsu |first=Spencer S. |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/public-safety/congressional-it-staffer-charged-with-home-equity-loan-fraud/2017/07/26/f5f402e8-71a7-11e7-9eac-d56bd5568db8_story.html |title=Congressional IT staffer charged with home equity loan fraud |publisher=[[Jeff Bezos#The Washington Post|Nash Holdings LLC]] |work=[[The Washington Post]] |date=July 26, 2017 |accessdate=July 28, 2017}}</ref> Awan's lawyer [[Chris Gowen]] said, "Mr. Awan's family is presently staying with extended family in Pakistan because he and his wife were both abruptly and unjustly fired, leaving them without a reliable source of income to pay typical U.S. living expenses, and because [[Far-right politics|extremist right-wing]] bloggers were beginning to harass them and their children."<ref name=NYT /><ref name="kept paying"/>


===Bank fraud court case===
===Bank fraud court case===

Revision as of 22:52, 4 August 2017

For the cricketer, see Imran Awan (cricketer).

Imran Awan (born 1980) is a Pakistani-American information technology worker. He has worked as a shared employee for Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives. In July 2017, at the time of his arrest, he had been working for Democrats as an information technologist for 13 years.

Biography

Awan is a Pakistani immigrant and from Lorton, Virginia.[1][2] Awan started working on Capitol Hill in January 2004 as an information technology director for Robert Wexler.[3] He has provided technical support for 25 other House Democrats, working as a shared employee.[3][4]

By 2005, he was working for future Democratic National Committee head Debbie Wasserman Schultz. Awan managed to get his wife, Hina Alvi, on the House payroll. Then his brother, Abid Awan, then Abid’s wife, Natalia Sova. In December 2012, Awan brought into the Congress Rao Abbas as a colleague, someone to whom he owed money and who might have had no qualifications at all to work IT. Rao Abbas wound up working in the office of then member of the House Intelligence Committee Patrick Murphy, as well as for Rep. Ted Deutch. Rao Abbas was paid $250,000.[5][6] Then Awan also managed to bring his youngest brother Jamal, on board in 2014.[7]

Imran Awan and his associates did not have security clearances.[6]

Awan and his family had plenty business elsewhere, a litany of court documents accused them of false financial-disclosure forms, bankruptcy fraud, life-insurance fraud, tax fraud and extortion. In 2010, Abid Awan declared bankruptcy claiming losses of $1 million on a car-retail business that he operated in Falls Church, Virginia while supposedly working "full time" on the Hill. The business was named Cars International A, abbreviated on its business cards as CIA.[6] According to an analysis the Awan family collected $5 million since 2003 and “appeared at one time or another on an estimated 80 House Democrats’ payrolls.” Yet House staffers claimed most of the family were “ghost” employees and didn’t come to work.[8]

Awan used a laptop in Wasserman Schultz’s office that was, concealed in an “unused crevice” in the Rayburn House Office Building for the House of Representatives. The police confiscate the laptop but Wasserman-Schultz tried to recover it before it could be looked at. Wasserman-Schultz pressured the Chief of the Capitol Police Matthew Verderosa to return it, threatening him by saying “you should expect that there will be consequences.”[6]

2017 investigations

Alleged procurement scam

In February 2017, Awan and some of his relatives were being investigated for allegedly stealing equipment from the House Democrats and violating the House IT network rules.[4][3] After this investigation was revealed, Awan lost access to the House computer network, and most of his employers dismissed him and other House staffers involved in the case, including Awan's relatives.[3] Debbie Wasserman Schultz, however, continued to employ Awan in an advisory role.[3][4][9]

On March 5, 2017, the FBI along with the Capitol Police got to Dulles Airport stopped Awan's wife, Hina Alvi, before she embarked. Despite discovering $12,400 in undeclared cash that she was carrying, they allowed her and their three children to fly to Lahore. There has been no explanation why she was even allowed to leave, since carrying more than $10,000 out of the country without reporting it is a felony.[6][10][3][11] Awan's lawyer Chris Gowen said, "Mr. Awan's family is presently staying with extended family in Pakistan because he and his wife were both abruptly and unjustly fired, leaving them without a reliable source of income to pay typical U.S. living expenses, and because extremist right-wing bloggers were beginning to harass them and their children."[3][9]

Bank fraud court case

In January 2017, Awan and Alvi got a home equity loan for $165,000 on a house in Alexandria, Virginia from the Coastal Federal Credit Union.[3][11] According to Awan's arrest warrant, the couple did not occupy this house, and sent the money as part of a wire transfer of $283,000 to two individuals in Faisalabad, Pakistan.[3][12]

In late July 2017, Awan pleaded not guilty to one count of bank fraud.[3] He was ordered to turn over his passport, abide by a curfew, and wear a GPS device. On July 24, the Federal Bureau of Investigations and U.S. Capitol Police arrested Awan at the Washington Dulles International Airport.[3][13] He had previously purchased a ticket to Lahore, Pakistan with a return flight in January 2018.[1][14] On July 25, Wasserman Schultz fired Awan after learning about his arrest.[3][15]

Espionage investigations

August 2017, the FBI was looking into any possible espionage involving Imran Awan, his associates and Dr. Ali A. al-Attar, a 1989 graduate of the American University of Beirut Faculty of Medicine.[6]

References

  1. ^ a b Pergram, Chad; Gibson, Jake (July 25, 2017). "Feds arrest IT staffer for Wasserman Schultz trying to leave country". Fox News. Retrieved July 27, 2017.
  2. ^ Reid, Paula (July 26, 2017). "Former Wasserman Schultz IT staffer arrested on charges of bank fraud". CBS News. Retrieved July 28, 2017.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Fandos, Nicholas. "Trump Fuels Intrigue Surrounding a Former I.T. Worker's Arrest". The New York Times. The New York Times Company. Retrieved July 29, 2017.
  4. ^ a b c Caygle, Heather (February 6, 2017). "House staffers under criminal investigation still employed". Politico. Politico. Retrieved July 27, 2017.
  5. ^ http://nypost.com/2017/03/04/capitol-hill-staffers-probed-for-theft-worked-for-nyc-congressmen/
  6. ^ a b c d e f Philip Giraldi: The Strange Case of Imran Awan - Only fraud or something more?, The American Conservative, August 3, 2017
  7. ^ http://www.nationalreview.com/article/449983/debbie-wasserman-schultz-pakistani-computer-guys-bank-fraud
  8. ^ Kimberley A. Strassel: The Scandal That Matters, The Wall Street Journal, Aug. 3, 2017
  9. ^ a b Daugherty, Alex; Sherman, Amy (July 26, 2017). "Wasserman Schultz kept paying tech expert suspected of stealing House computers". Miami Herald. The McClatchy Company. Retrieved July 27, 2017.
  10. ^ http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/449860/hina-alvi-imran-awan-debbie-wasserman-shultz-it-staffers-attempts-fled-country
  11. ^ a b Hsu, Spencer S. (July 26, 2017). "Congressional IT staffer charged with home equity loan fraud". The Washington Post. Nash Holdings LLC. Retrieved July 28, 2017.
  12. ^ Fatzick, Joshua (July 26, 2017). "Top Democrat IT Aide Arrested While Trying to Leave US for Pakistan". Voice of America. Broadcasting Board of Governors. Retrieved July 27, 2017.
  13. ^ Watkins, Eli (July 27, 2017). "Democratic staffer arrested on bank fraud charge". CNN. Turner Broadcasting System. Retrieved July 28, 2017.
  14. ^ Caygle, Heather; Bresnahan, John (July 25, 2017). "Wasserman Schultz aide arrested trying to leave the country". Politico. Politico. Retrieved July 27, 2017.
  15. ^ "Wasserman Schultz Fires IT Staffer Following Fraud Arrest". Associated Press. July 27, 2017. Retrieved July 28, 2017.
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