Hanford Subcontractor Agrees to $1.1 Million-Plus COVID Fraud Penalty

US Attorney's for the Eastern District of Washington announced a guilty plea from a Hanford subcontractor concerning COVID relief fraud.

  The company pleaded guilty

BNL Technical Services, LLC (BNL), according  to Bloomberg company profiles, was created in 2008 and offers professional engineering services and other tasks.

The US Attorney's Office says BNL, working as a Hanford subcontractor, applied for Paycheck Protection Plan assistance due to COVID in April of 2020. According to Federal officials:

 "In April of 2020, BNL applied for and received a $493,865 loan as part of the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP). Congress created the PPP in March 2020 as part of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, to provide funding to small businesses in order to mitigate the economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic for small and local businesses."

They went on to say:

"BNL fraudulently sought and obtained PPP funding for BNL employees despite their pay and benefits already being covered by DOE contract funds and other federal sources including the Veterans Administration. Shortly after receiving the funds, BNL transferred and used more than $424,230 of the PPP proceeds on unauthorized expenditures."

In August of 2021, BNL, through its sole owner Wilson Pershing Stevenson III, requested and was granted forgiveness of the $493,865 PPP loan, by falsely and fraudulently certifying the loan proceeds had been used for eligible uses and business expenses between April and October of 2020."

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  An entry from the Better Business Bureau shows on December 4th of 2021, the BBB learned BNL had not obtained a necessary license from WA State Labor and Industries. They also reported the pending Federal action against the company, and said BNL was no longer in business.

Various business data  reporting websites indicated the company had between 20 and 50 workers, although they did not indicate how many directly worked for Hanford.

Sentencing for Stevenson III is set for March 11 of 2025 in Federal Court in Yakima.