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A Salem man has pleaded guilty to a fraud scheme involving COVID-19 relief funds for small businesses.

Roosevelt Fernandez, 42, pleaded guilty last week in Boston federal court to two counts of wire fraud and one count of aggravated identity theft, according to a statement from the U.S. attorney’s office.

According to the statement, Fernandez applied for 10 COVID-related Economic Injury Disaster Loans from the U.S. Small Business Administration, either in his own name or in the names of entities he controlled. In June 2020, Fernandez applied for an EIDL under the name Soluciones Multi Service, an entity he controlled, and submitted a false tax filing in support of the application, the statement said.

The SBA deposited $124,900 into a bank account controlled by Fernandez, and he withdrew more than $80,000 in cash from the account over the next two weeks, the statement said.

Fernandez then applied for an EIDL in August 2020 in the name of another business using fraudulent tax filing information, the statement said, and the SBA deposited $149,900 into the same bank account.

Fernandez also pleaded guilty to a second scheme where he used the identities of various individuals to submit fraudulent state and federal tax returns. Some of these returns included fraudulent W-2 Forms purportedly issued by employers that did not employ the named taxpayer, the statement said.

Various fraudulent refunds were deposited into an account in the name of Soluciones Multi Service. In addition, a May 2020 fraudulent Economic Income Payment – stimulus authorized by CARES Act – was deposited into this same account. Fernandez was depicted on ATM surveillance footage depositing another fraudulent tax refund check into this account, the statement said. Overall, the investigation uncovered approximately 40 fraudulent tax returns associated with Fernandez, totaling over $620,000 in requested refunds.

Sentencing has been scheduled for May 11.