As we've reported here frequently over the years, it's long been known that the various COVID relief programs turned out to be a favorite target for scammers, who lined up in massive numbers to vacuum cash out of programs that were hastily put in place with little to no oversight of where the money was going. The losses mounted into the tens of billions. Some of the thieves were eventually identified and prosecuted, but most of the money will never be recovered. Now that the COVID money is drying up, however, the scammers are in need of new targets. Not to worry! There's always plenty of taxpayer money waiting to be plundered and Janet Yamanaka Mello of Texas found an extremely lucrative way to fleece the American military for her own benefit. She stole more than $100 million from the Army over a period of six years and spent it on a luxurious lifestyle. As a bonus, the funds were intended to be used to provide vital services to military children and families. (USA Today)

A Texas woman who stole nearly $109 million from a grant program intended to provide services for military children and families to fund her lavish lifestyle was sentenced Tuesday to federal prison, the U.S. Attorney's Office said.

Janet Yamanaka Mello, 57, was sentenced to 15 years in federal court in San Antonio, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Western District of Texas said in a news release. According to a criminal court docket, Mello pleaded guilty in March to five counts of mail fraud and five counts of filing a false tax return for a scheme that went undetected by the U.S. Army for six years.

Mello was a civilian employee for the Army and worked as a child, youth, and school services financial program manager for the Army Morale, Welfare, and Recreation program at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, court documents showed. As part of her job, Mello determined whether funds were available for various entities that applied to the 4-H Military Partnership Grant program.

So how did Ms. Mello manage to pull this off? It turns out that it wasn't really very difficult at all for someone who found themself in the right place at the right time. She wasn't even particularly clever about it. As noted above, she secured a position as a manager in an Army child, youth, and school program at Fort Sam Houston. It was part of the 4-H Military Partnership Grant program. She was in charge of reviewing applications for aid through the program. So she set up a fake charity, began applying for grants, and just approved them herself.

Before long, she was raking in millions of dollars. Rather than going to children in need, Mello reportedly spent the cash on high-end jewelry, clothing, luxury vehicles, and real estate. She was living her own lifestyle of the rich and famous while supposedly only earning the salary of a midlevel civilian contractor. How is it possible that nobody noticed after all that time? Well, someone did eventually and Mello was investigated and then arrested. She was just sentenced to fifteen years in prison. But just as with all of the COVID funds that went missing, the money that Mello took will likely be almost impossible to recover.

Keep in mind that Janet Yamanaka Mello was stealing this money from children. And not just any children. These are the children of our military families. Even more to the point, the Army technically doesn't have any money of its own, just as the federal government doesn't. She was stealing that money from you, the taxpayers. 

The similarities between this case the the fraud perpetrated against the COVID relief funds are stunning and infuriating. While the fault for the theft lies on the shoulders of the thief, this sort of thing shouldn't be possible to begin with. And it wouldn't be possible if these systems were designed with the appropriate amount of oversight built into them. No one person should be given the power to receive, review, and approve grant applications, particularly with the amount of money we're talking about here. There should be multiple people involved in the process. That would at least reduce the chances for fraud unless they start teaming up to game the system. If you make public money too easy to steal, someone will come along to steal it sooner or later. That's just the sad reality of the situation. And the money in that grant program was clearly too easy to shake loose.