MA Man Pleads Guilty To PPP Fraud In RI Court

PROVIDENCE, RI — A Massachusetts man who faked his own suicide pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Providence to conspiring to commit bank fraud and failure to appear in court. David Adler Staveley, along with his partner, was the first person in the country to be accused of fraud related to federal coronavirus relief funds.

Staveley, who also went by Kurt David Sanborn and David Sanborn, is a 45-year-old resident of Andover, Massachusetts. In court, he admitted that he and his partner, 53-year-old Warwick resident David Andrew Butziger, to file four fraudulent applications for the Paycheck Protection Program, part of the federal Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act. The loan applications were filed with a bank in Rhode Island.

The loan applications requested $185,570 to pay employees at Top of the Bay restaurant in Warwick, Rhode Island, $144,050 at Remington House Inn restaurant, also in Warwick, $108,777 for On The Trax restaurant in Berlin, Massachusetts and $105,381 for "dock Wireless," which was not an incorporated business.

At the time the loan applications were submitted, both Remington House Inn and On The Trax were closed. Neither have since reopened. In addition, Staveley had no ownership stake in Top of the Bay, the Department of Justice said, while Dock Wireless had no employees or ever paid any wages to employees.

Last May, Staveley and Butziger were the first in the country charged with defrauding the PPP. In September, Staveley was indicted by a federal grand jury in Providence. After appearing in federal court, Staveley was released to home confinement with electronic monitoring. According to the DOJ, he removed his monitoring device three weeks later and fled. Staveley then staged a suicide, leaving notes with other people and in his car, which he left unlocked by the shore in Massachusetts, with his wallet left inside. Police later determined that from May 26 to July 23, 2020, Staveley traveled from state-to-state, using fake license plates and identities, the DOJ said. He was captured by the U.S. Marshals Service in Georgia on July 23, nearly two months after he was set to appear in federal court on June 3.

In court on Monday, Staveley pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit bank fraud and failure to appear in court as required. He is scheduled to be sentenced Aug. 2. Butziger pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit bank fraud in September and is scheduled to be sentenced in June.