Another former state lawmaker pleads guilty to pandemic-related fraud

By Ty Tagami
Bureau Chief
Capitol Beat News Service

 

ATLANTA — A third former Georgia lawmaker has pleaded guilty to unemployment assistance fraud in federal court in connection with the COVID-19 pandemic.

Sharon Henderson (D-113), 67, of Covington, pleaded guilty Thursday to making false statements to fraudulently obtain thousands of dollars from the federal government through a program established by Congress to help workers through the crisis, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

“While running for and holding political office, Representative Henderson was fleecing taxpayers, lying to steal money from federal programs intended to help people who lost their jobs due to the pandemic,” U.S. Attorney Theodore S. Hertzberg said in a statement.

Two other former state representatives, also Democrats, were previously convicted of similar unemployment assistance fraud.

Karen L. Bennett pleaded guilty Jan. 21 to making false statements to obtain $13,940 in unemployment benefits, and Dexter L. Sharper pleaded guilty March 11 to making false statements and collecting $13,825, according to Hertzberg’s office in the Northern District of Georgia.

Henderson pleaded guilty to collecting $17,811 in unemployment benefits by filing fraudulent weekly certifications that she could not report to her job with the Henry County Schools, Hertzberg’s office said. Henderson claimed she had worked for the school system throughout 2019 and into early 2020, until quarantines made that impossible.

Yet she had only worked as a substitute teacher for five days in 2018 and had signed an acknowledgment that substitutes were ineligible to draw unemployment wages, prosecutors said. She applied for unemployment benefits in June 2020 while running for the state House and filed eight fraudulent certifications in June 2021 after she was sworn in, they added.

Henderson is scheduled for sentencing before U.S. District Judge Michael L. Brown on Nov. 3.