WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A federal grand jury on Thursday indicted former Kansas state Rep. Michael Capps on 19 counts alleging that he tried to defraud federal, state and county government organizations out of more than $450,000 in coronavirus relief funding.
The U.S. Attorney’s office in Kansas said in a news release that Capps, a Republican from Wichita, filed forms inflating the number of employees he had at two businesses and a sports foundation, and then applied for loans to pay the non-existent employees.
The alleged fraud involved the Small Business Administration’s Paycheck Protection Program and Emergency Injury Disaster Loan programs, which are designed to provide assistance to businesses that struggled during the pandemic.