Fake Labor Department "Auditor" Texted Business Owners to Take Over Their Retirement Plans. He Just Pleaded Guilty.

Imagine you own a small business in Pittsburgh. A guy contacts you saying he's with the U.S. Department of Labor. He wants to look at your company retirement plan. Then he finds a "problem" and tells you the fix is to fire your plan advisor and hand control of the plan to ... him.

Read that again.

So what happened?

On November 2, 2026, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Western District of Pennsylvania announced that Lazaven Mitchell, 38, of Pittsburgh, pleaded guilty in federal court to one count of false impersonation of a federal officer or employee. U.S. Attorney Troy Rivetti announced the plea, which was entered before Senior United States District Judge David Stewart Cercone.

The release is attached: U.S. Attorney's Office release on the Mitchell plea.

According to what the court was told in connection with the plea, Mitchell is a Pittsburgh-based licensed financial advisor and loan officer. On multiple occasions between April 2024 and June 2024, he presented himself to local businesses as working for the Labor Department's Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA). That's the agency that oversees retirement plans.

Here's how the play worked:

• Mitchell would contact Pittsburgh businesses, say he was with EBSA, and ask to review their retirement plans for compliance.
• After looking at a plan, he'd identify a compliance issue.
• Then he'd recommend the business terminate its current advisor and transfer the plan to him as plan administrator. He even gave owners a draft letter to sign firing the old advisor.
• To make it look official, he sent a letter bearing the Department of Labor seal and the EBSA mailing address in Washington, D.C.

The text messages

This is the part that caught my eye.

In text messages with one business owner, Mitchell referenced having "a final determination from the DOL" and talked about coming to the business to retrieve "the documents for the Department of Labor inquiry."

In a text to a different business owner, he sent a fictitious business card. It had EBSA's name and crest, his name with the title "Employee Benefit Advisor," and an address for a suite in the William S. Moorhead Federal Building.

A fake business card. By text. With a federal crest on it. I'd much rather see that level of commitment pointed at something legal.

Why should you care?

Look, most of you reading this aren't pretending to be federal agents. (Hopefully.) But here's the thing ... government impersonation is one of the most common ways scammers get people to drop their guard, and text messages make it quick and cheap.

When a message says "Department of Labor," "IRS," or "Medicare," people stop asking questions. That's exactly why regulators and prosecutors go after it so hard. And it's why any legitimate business that reaches out by phone or text needs to be crystal clear about who it is.

If you run outreach, ask yourself a simple question: could anything in your scripts, texts, or caller ID make someone think you're the government? If the answer is "maybe," fix it today.

What to do

• Say who you are. Every call and text should identify your actual company. No vague names that sound like an agency.
• No official-looking seals or crests. Don't borrow government branding for your materials. Just don't.
• Keep your reps in check. One rep with a fake title can get your whole company into serious trouble.
• Teach your team the red flags. If someone claiming to be a regulator asks you to switch vendors, call the agency directly using a number you look up yourself.

What's next

Judge Cercone scheduled sentencing for March 25, 2027. The law provides for a maximum sentence of up to three years in prison, a fine of up to the greater of $250,000 or twice the gross pecuniary gain to Mitchell, or both. Under the federal Sentencing Guidelines, the actual sentence will be based on the seriousness of the offense and any prior criminal history.

Assistant United States Attorney Brendan J. McKenna is prosecuting the case. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the U.S. Department of Labor Office of Inspector General investigated.

Trust is everything in this business. Build it honestly. That's it.

Source: U.S. Attorney's Office for the Western District of Pennsylvania, Pittsburgh Financial Advisor Pleads Guilty to Falsely Impersonating Department of Labor Employee (Nov. 2, 2026).