Pastor and son Evan and Josh Edwards, who were allegedly involved in an $8 million scandal during covid-19 got arrested.
Evan Edwards, 64, and Josh Edwards, 30 applied for a $6 million Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loan in April 2020. They applied for this loan to cover the rent and utilities of their alleged ministry- ASLAN International Ministry. Eventually, a loan of $8.4 million was approved for them.
But investigation soon began to figure out the nature of the ministry and it was found out that the ministry does not exist. At the time of taking the loan, it was said that the ministry had 486 employees and a monthly payroll of $2.7 million.
But when Federal investigators started researching the ministry it was found that the website links provided by the father-son were not working. The location of the ministry was empty and the neighbors said that they had never seen anyone going inside or coming out.
Federal investigators also tried to reach an employee, who was the accountant of the Ministry. But it turned out the man had dementia and had not worked in the ministry since 2017.
These were all enough red flags to see that this was a case of bank fraud. Thus, on Wednesday the police raided the house of Evan and Josh, where Evan was arrested in a wheelchair while Josh was handcuffed.
Recent Updates on the Scandal
The duo was arrested at 7 AM on Wednesday from their beach house in New Smyrna. It was also found out that they spent a whopping $3.7 million on buying a 4,700-square-foot home in a new Disney World development called Golden Oaks. But this deal never went through, as the authorities seized the $868,000 down payment.
Both men now face a series of six charges including bank, visa, and immigration fraud. The family is originally from Canada. They also spent some time in Turkey doing missionary work and came to Florida in 2019.
