Brockton Woman Gets Two Months for $931,745 Treasury Check She Said Came From a Man She Met Online
Lana Ruel, 71, was sentenced to two months in prison for depositing a stolen $931,745 tax refund check that was owed to a Brooklyn home health company.
A 71-year-old Brockton, Massachusetts, woman who tried to deposit a stolen U.S. Treasury tax refund check for $931,745.28 has been sentenced to two months in prison, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Boston said.
U.S. District Judge Allison D. Burroughs sentenced Lana Ruel on Oct. 5, 2026, to two months in prison followed by two months of supervised release. Ruel may also be ordered to pay restitution later. She pleaded guilty on June 11, 2026, to one count of theft of government funds, a charge that carries up to 10 years in prison, according to the office’s announcement of her plea.
A COVID-era tax credit check
The check was a refund owed to a home health care company in Brooklyn, New York, under the Employee Retention Credit, a tax credit for some businesses affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the sworn affidavit an IRS Criminal Investigation special agent filed when Ruel was charged in December 2025. The affidavit is part of the public court file.
The company’s owner told the agent it expected six refund checks and received five. The missing one was the check Ruel deposited, according to the affidavit. He said his company works only in New York and that he did not know Ruel.
What the court record shows
According to the affidavit:
- On or about March 25, 2025, Ruel used the Brooklyn company’s name to incorporate a business in Massachusetts, listing herself as its president, treasurer, secretary and director.
- On or about April 11, 2025, she opened a business account at M&T Bank in that name, and over the next six weeks deposited about $2,200. Her largest purchase in that period was about $39 at a grocery store.
- On or about May 23, 2025, she deposited the Treasury check, which was made out to the real company at its Brooklyn address.
- On May 27, 2025, the bank rejected the deposit and took back the full amount. The same day, Ruel called the bank on a recorded line and said she could “explain what the check was, where it came from, and what it’s for.”
When the agent interviewed her in September 2025, Ruel said she had started the company to offer home care consulting and that the check had been mailed to her by a man she met on an online dating site almost two years earlier, according to the affidavit. The agent wrote that there was probable cause to believe she lied in that interview and that she intended to send the money to that man.
The agent also wrote that over two years Ruel had created four other Massachusetts companies that did not appear to have a legitimate business purpose, and for one of them opened accounts at about eight banks. The U.S. Attorney’s Office, in announcing her sentence, put that number at about 10. In both accounts, money was wired in and then wired out or withdrawn in cash, and the banks closed the accounts.
The case in court
Ruel was arrested on Dec. 10, 2025, and a federal public defender was appointed to represent her, the docket shows. In January 2026 the court scheduled a hearing in proceedings to revoke her release; the docket entries available do not show the outcome.
IRS Criminal Investigation and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service investigated the case, which was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Benjamin Saltzman.
