Florida pastor and son arrested in alleged $8m Covid relief fraud scheme

A Florida pastor and his son have been arrested for allegedly fraudulently obtaining more than $8m in federal Covid relief funds.

Evan and Joshua Edwards of Orlando were arrested on Wednesday, alleged to have used such funds for luxury expenses including a multi-million-dollar house near Walt Disney World.

“I’m glad they got arrested,” a neighbor told NBC News, speaking on condition of anonymity. “It’s a long time coming.”

The father and son, both from Canada, face charges including conspiracy to commit bank fraud, the Daytona Beach News-Journal reported.

The Edwards are Christian missionaries who ran a faith-based organization, Aslan International Ministry, with the expressed purpose of communicating “Christian love in doctrine and service to the poor”.

After doing missionary work in Turkey, the family moved to Florida in 2019, settling about an hour outside Orlando.

Federal prosecutors now allege that beginning in April 2020, the Edwards family committed fraud by submitting a fraudulent loan application to the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) which said the family ministry had 486 employees and a monthly payroll of $2.7m.

According to a complaint released by the Department of Justice, the family used the funds to purchase a home in Golden Oak, a Four Seasons Private Residence.

Funds were transferred into family bank accounts “in an attempt to hide and conceal their whereabouts”, the complaint said.

Federal agents attempted to search the Golden Oak home in September 2020 but found it empty. The family were then pulled over in their Mercedes SUV, NBC reported. Police found bags containing shredded documents, financial records and electronic devices placed in “Faraday bags”, to block radio frequencies and prevent tracking.

The family was taken into custody on an immigration charge but released the next day when the case was dismissed. In April 2021, a judge ordered the forfeiture of the $8.4m the family fraudulently received. The family did not contest the seizure.

Evan and Joshua Edwards were taken into custody five months after NBC published details of the scam and its attempted cover-up.