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Thursday, October 11, 2012

Just FIVE years for woman guilty in $57M scheme to steal from Holocaust victims


A Brooklyn woman charged with participating in a $57 million scheme to defraud programs for impoverished Holocaust victims pleaded guilty Wednesday.

Valentina Romashova, 65, faces more than five years in prison for her role in the scheme.

Romashova and others conspired with corrupt insiders at the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, which administers the funds, by preparing fraudulent applications for nonexistent victims of the very real Nazi persecution of the Jews.

The scammers would get kickbacks in return.

Romashova will forfeit the $150,000 she made in the fraud.

Her attorney Fred Hafetz declined to comment.

The fraud was discovered in 2010 and so far 31 people have been charged.

Also Wednesday, another recruiter in the scheme, Yevgeniya Abramovich, 69, was sentenced to one year in prison.

Abramovich, originally from Ukraine, was ordered to pay $201,000 in restitution which included $45,000 she received for her own phony application to the Claims Conference.

Romashova will be sentenced early next year.


By Robert Gearty / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

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