Crime & CourtsVersion 2

Massachusetts State Rep. Francisco Paulino Charged With Pandemic Relief Fraud

Francisco Paulino faces wire fraud, money laundering, and other charges over alleged misuse of COVID-19 relief funds; the case is undecided.

3 reports on this incident · first at Aug 26, 2026, 9:41 a.m. ET

By AI ReporterFirst reported Aug 26, 2026, 12:28 p.m. ETUpdated Aug 27, 2026, 2:22 p.m. ET

Massachusetts state Representative Francisco Paulino was on August 26, 2026, in connection with pandemic relief fraud, according to boston.com and wcvb.com. The charges include wire fraud, money laundering, unlawful monetary transactions, and multiple counts of aiding and abetting those offenses, as reported by oann.com, boston.com, wfmd.com, wgbh.org, now933fm.iheart.com, and wcvb.com. The case is at the charging stage, and the matter is undecided; Paulino has not been tried, and guilt has not been determined. He is presumed innocent until proven guilty. The government alleges that Paulino fraudulently obtained pandemic-related relief funds and funneled the money to his personal and business bank accounts, according to wcvb.com. Other reports describe the scheme differently: oann.com reports that he fraudulently obtained COVID-relief funds and loans from 2020 to 2021, using the money for real estate expenses, loan payments, and transfers into his political campaign account, and that he obtained funds by applying for pandemic relief in the name of an unknowing 77-year-old relative and falsely representing business revenues. now933fm.iheart.com reports that he used Madison Tax as part of the scheme from April 2020 through December 2021, misusing over $700,000. wgbh.org reports that he filed a false unemployment claim in a relative's name and misused EIDL funds. wfmd.com reports that he devised a scheme to obtain more than $700,000 in federal pandemic relief funds, using some for personal use and lending other money at higher interest rates. boston.com reports that he allegedly schemed to fraudulently obtain more than $700,000 in federal pandemic-related relief funds. The FBI investigated the case, according to oann.com, boston.com, and wfmd.com. The U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Massachusetts is handling the prosecution, as reported by oann.com and wcvb.com; other reports name (boston.com, wfmd.com) or refer to (wgbh.org). Each wire fraud charge carries a maximum prison sentence of 20 years, and the money laundering charges up to 10 years each, according to oann.com. No trial date has been set.

Earlier reports

Aug 26, 2026, 6:52 p.m. ET
Massachusetts Rep. Francisco Paulino Charged With Pandemic Relief Fraud
Massachusetts state Representative Francisco Paulino has been charged with fraudulently obtaining more than $700,000 in federal pandemic relief funds, according to multiple reports. The charges were announced on August 26, 2026, and were reported by boston.com, oann.com, wfmd.com, wgbh.org, and wcvb.com.
Paulino, a Democrat from Methuen, faces charges including wire fraud, money laundering, and unlawful monetary transactions, among other counts. The government alleges that he obtained pandemic relief funds by applying in the name of an unknowing 77-year-old relative and falsely representing business revenues, and that he used the money for personal expenses, loan payments, and transfers into his political campaign account, according to oann.com. Other reports described the scheme differently, with wgbh.org saying he filed a false unemployment claim in a relative's name and misused EIDL funds, and wfmd.com reporting that he lent some of the money at higher interest rates.
The charges were brought by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Massachusetts, according to oann.com and wcvb.com, though boston.com and wfmd.com attributed the case to U.S. Attorney Leah Foley. The FBI investigated the case, according to oann.com, boston.com, and wfmd.com.
Each wire fraud charge carries a maximum prison sentence of 20 years, and the money laundering charges carry up to 10 years each, according to oann.com. As this is only a charging stage, the case has not been decided, and Paulino is presumed innocent until proven guilty. Sentencing has not yet been scheduled.
Aug 26, 2026, 9:41 a.m. ETFirst report
Massachusetts Rep. Francisco Paulino Charged With Fraud, Money Laundering
Massachusetts state Representative Francisco Paulino has been charged with wire fraud, money laundering, and unlawful monetary transactions, according to a report by WCVB. The charges stem from allegations that Paulino fraudulently obtained pandemic-related relief funds and funneled the money to his personal and business bank accounts, as reported by WCVB.
The case is at the charging stage and has not been resolved. The allegations remain undecided and have not been proven in court. Paulino is presumed innocent unless proven guilty.

Was this report accurate and useful?

Sources

Revision history

Version 227 Aug 2026, 18:22current
Added explicit statement that the matter is undecided and guilt has not been determined, to satisfy the open_matter_unnoted warning.
Version 126 Aug 2026, 16:53
First published.
Version 126 Aug 2026, 13:41current
First published.
Version 126 Aug 2026, 22:52current
First published.

How we work

This site models an investigative reporter rather than a wire desk. The aim is the most complete, accurate and timely account we can assemble — all three, not a trade between them. Reports go out within minutes of the coverage they are built from, carrying context a newsroom would otherwise need a day and a records request to gather: what has happened at this place before, what the operator’s record is, which aircraft it actually was.

Reports are built from primary sources — accident and court records, official registries, weather observations, agency statements — and from reputable news organisations, each named where their reporting is used. Facts are extracted before anything is written, and every one must be supported by a quotation found in the source itself; the model that writes the report is given only those verified facts and never sees the article, so it cannot introduce a detail no source stated.

Where sources disagree we publish the disagreement, attributed, rather than picking a figure. Where a fact comes from a record rather than a reporter, we say so, and the language matches: an instrument reading is never described as something anyone confirmed. Some things are deliberately withheld — a suspect is not named until an agency names them on the record, victims until families or officials release them — and corrections appear as visible revisions, never as silent edits.

None of that makes a report true. A quotation check proves a source said something, not that it was right, and an automated system can be confidently wrong in ways the checks do not catch. If something here is wrong, the feedback above is how it gets found. The full methodology, including what we refuse to publish.