Paulsboro Man Accused Of Stealing $243K In Decades-Long Social Security Scam

By Jim Melwert

PAULSBORO, N.J. (CBS) -- A southern New Jersey man is in hot water for a Social Security scam that authorities allege was worth nearly a quarter-million dollars.

The indictment alleges 62-year-old Nicholas Serevino Junior, of Paulsboro, fraudulently collected $243,844 in Social Security benefits from 1984 through 2013 that were going to a false identity created by his father.

"The defendant's father adopted a second identity," says Elie Honig with the New Jersey Attorney General's Office, "and earned wages in the name of that second identity."

Honig says Serevino's father worked at one job under his given name, but then a second job under a fake name, with the intent that his son would collect the benefits when he died.

"Because there would never be any reports that the fake person had died," Honig says.

But the Social Security Administration routinely visits any beneficiaries who reach the age of 100 to make sure they're still alive.

If convicted, Serevino faces a sentence of five to 10 years in state prison and $150,000 in restitution.