OXFORD — The prosecution called its last witness in the J5 fraud case Monday morning. Financial analyst Crystal Lyles walked the court through how and when money was transferred into North Atlantic Security and Edwards Enterprises accounts, and where it went subsequently.
Jabari Edwards and Antwann Richardson are accused of misusing several million dollars in federal pandemic relief funds. The Columbus men each face 17 criminal counts, including wire fraud, conspiracy to commit wire fraud, money laundering and making false statements.
The case centers around a group of companies owned by Edwards, which includes J5 Solutions, J5 GBL, the Bridge Group and North Atlantic Security Services. Also involved is Edwards’ personal, limited-liability company Edwards Enterprises. Edwards owned the companies, but Richardson oversaw the day-to-day operations.
Lyles is an employee of Case Corp., which contracts with the federal government to perform analysis of bank records. She testified that the government provided her with records from a host of Edwards’ companies, as well as Edwards’ and Richardson’s personal accounts, where ill-gotten pandemic relief funds allegedly flowed through.
Lyles testified that Paycheck Protection Program loan money was deposited into a NAS account on Jan. 22, 2021, and funds were being transferred out by Jan. 25. Money intended for NAS was commingled with money in other accounts, including that of J5 Solutions, a holding company that served as an umbrella for many of Edwards’ other businesses.
Money from those accounts was used for a variety of purposes, she testified, including a car note on a Cadillac Escalade and payments for a Kubota tractor, as well as loan repayments. Several thousand dollars were also transferred to J5 GBL for payroll.
Some of that money did make its way to NAS, she testified, for both payroll and operating expenses.
One of the central arguments the government made is that it is illegal for funds received by one company to be used at another company.
In both October and November of 2021, NAS received Economic Injury Disaster Loan money, Lyles testified. The money was used for a variety of purposes, including paying payroll taxes and taxes due in Alabama and Louisiana, payroll for J5 Solutions, and as payments to Russell Sheffield, one of Edwards’ business partners.
Lyles testified that the bulk of the money was spent on purposes that did not have anything to do with payroll or expenses at NAS.
Finally, Lyles testified two tranches of money for Edwards Enterprises were also divvied out to Edwards’ other companies. Some of this money also went to give checks with the memo line “I love you” to several of Edwards’ employees and to his wife.
On cross examination, Lyles was pressed on how she knew what money went where.
Lyles testified that she did not have knowledge of other funding sources that might have been coming into Edwards’ companies at the time because they were outside the scope of what she was asked to do, which was scrutinize the PPP and EIDL funds specifically.
Richardson’s attorney, Victor Fleitas, contended there were legitimate revenue streams moving through those accounts. He accused Lyles of not looking for business revenue.
“The deposits don’t say they are from invoice X,” Lyles said. “I can only see what account the deposits were made from.”
She did agree that there were more sources of deposits than the PPP and EIDL loans but said she was not asked to track those.
Edwards’ attorney, Chandler Rogers, took a similar tack, pressing Lyles on the payments being made into company coffers from non-loan money.
Rogers claimed during early 2021 — the same time Edwards and Richardson were allegedly putting in the fraudulent PPP application for NAS — that NAS received $171,000 for contract work, and Lyle said she didn’t look at that particular account because no illegal funds were alleged to have passed through it.
“NAS showed $811,000 in gross revenue in 2021,” Rogers said. “J5 GBL showed $5.4 million in gross revenue. Between January and September 2021 J5 GBL made $4 million in income. Were you aware of any of that?”
Lyles said she was not, repeating that she only looked at accounts with allegedly illegal money moving through them.
With Lyles’ testimony, the government rested its case.
Brian Jones is the local government reporter for Columbus and Lowndes County.
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