A South Florida couple convicted of bilking about $380,000 from a fund set up to repay losses caused by the 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico has been sentenced to 13 years in prison.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office reports that Joseph Harvey and Anja Karin Kannell were sentenced Wednesday in Miami federal court. They each were previously convicted of multiple counts, including mail fraud, wire fraud, access device fraud and aggravated identity theft.
Shortly after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, BP set up a $20 billion trust fund to repay losses to individuals and businesses.
From August 2010 to January 2011, authorities say the couple filed fraudulent claims against the fund using 34 assumed identities. The identities belonged to actual people living in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and the Florida Panhandle.
