Plantersville woman pleads guilty to government fraud
OXFORD – A Lee County woman is facing up to a decade in a federal prison after pleading guilty to submitting fraudulent unemployment benefit forms.
Misty Lynn Burgess, 48, of Plantersville, submitted an application for unemployment benefits using her sister’s personal information in May 2020. At the time, her sister was an inmate at the Central Mississippi Correctional Facility in Pearl and therefore, ineligible for unemployment benefits.
A federal grand jury handed down a two-count indictment in December 2023 charging her with theft of government funds and wire fraud. The first count said Burgess received more than $15,600 in fraudulent unemployment benefits in her sister’s name. The second count was based on the fact that the Mississippi Department of Employment Services programs are cloud-based and located in another state.
“This is one of the many unemployment compensation cases we’ve worked on in the last year,” State Auditor Shad White said in a statement. “We will continue to use the latest technology and methods, which has led to my team recovering more money in the last five years than any other five-year period in state history.”
Burgess was arraigned in February and ordered to held in federal custody until her trial, which was scheduled for June 17 in Oxford. Instead, Burgess accepted a plea agreement from the U.S. Attorney’s office and pleaded guilty on May 16 to the theft charge. In exchange for the plea, the government agreed to drop the wire fraud charge.
When she returns to court Sept. 5 for her sentencing hearing, U.S. District Judge Mike Mills could sentence her to up to 10 years in prison, up to a $250,000 (plus restitution) and up to three years of supervised release.
