NYC Women Scammed COVID Isolation Hotel Program For $400K: Feds

NEW YORK CITY — Four women scammed $400,000 from the city’s COVID-19 hotel program by pretending to be healthcare workers then selling the rooms on Facebook, prosecutors said Tuesday.

“B----, let me help you,” one alleged scammer told a friend. Said another, “Lol anything is possible wen [sic] u know a 311 operator.

Chanette “Netty Hott ”Lewis, 30, Tatiana “Kimora” Daniel, 27, and Heaven West, 21, were arrested Tuesday on federal fraud charges, Manhattan U.S. Attorney Audrey Strauss announced.

A fourth alleged conspirator, Tatiana “Ta Banks” Benjamin, 26, remains at large, prosecutors said.

The four women allegedly manipulated the city’s COVID-19 Hotel Room Isolation Program — designed to help New Yorkers exposed to the virus to self-isolate — by posing as healthcare workers then selling the rooms, according to prosecutors.

Lewis, of Brooklyn, used her job as a city call center operator to steal and sell healthcare workers’ hotel reservation codes to her alleged partners, the suit contends.

“I work for 311 oem that how I got doctors licenses and stuff,” Lewis allegedly wrote in a Facebook message. “I made 16K in 5 days I’m proud of myselfffff.”

Customers paid the women up to $300 in cash for hotel visits that lasted days or weeks, according to the suit.

The foursome claimed more than 2,700 nights’ worth of hotel rooms, for which the city and the Federal Emergency Management Agency paid roughly $400,000, the suit contends.

The women advertised the rooms on Facebook and even raised concerns about an impending investigation, according to the complaint.

“They finding out we was scamming the system lol,” wrote West. “All essential hotels are clipped.”

Charges leveled against Benjamin, Daniel, Lewis and West include wire fraud conspiracy, honest services fraud, and theft of government funds, court records show.

Said the U.S. Attorney, “When, as alleged here, people illicitly exploit a public health crisis for private gain, they will find themselves facing criminal charges.