Woman going to prison for FEMA, other scams

EAST ST. LOUIS, Ill. (AP) — A woman who claimed her New Orleans home was damaged by Hurricane Katrina and said she watched her two daughters die in the flooding was sentenced Wednesday to prison for making it up.

Tina Marie Winston, 34, was sentenced to four years in federal prison and ordered to pay about $24,000 for various scams covering more than a decade, including $4,358 she defrauded from the Federal Emergency Management Agency after the hurricane.

Winston is childless and lived near St. Louis when Katrina hit.

Winston pleaded guilty in October to receiving nearly $6,000 in Katrina disaster aid through FEMA. In September 2005, she used a fake Social Security number to file for hurricane assistance online. She received $4,358 from FEMA and spent $1,321.54 more with a FEMA debit card. She was arrested last June.