New task force brings federal, state resources together to fight fraud in Mississippi
www.wlbt.com, Holly Emery, October 6, 2026
JACKSON, Miss. (WLBT) - Mississippi officials are adding five new prosecutors to the fight against fraud through a new partnership between state and federal law enforcement.
The Mississippi Attorney General’s Office was awarded more than $2.5 million by the U.S. Department of Justice in July 2026 to establish Joint Task Force Vigilance, which officials describe as a first-of-its-kind model for combining federal and state resources to fight fraud. The task force brings together the Attorney General’s Office, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Mississippi, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Mississippi and the FBI.
“Together we’ll bring the full authority of our offices to bear on con artists, these grifters, these fraudsters and scammers. We’ll hold criminals accountable and definitely restore law and order,” Attorney General Lynn Fitch said.
The funding will pay for five experienced prosecutors, along with legal and law enforcement staff to support them. The attorneys will hold dual titles as both state assistant attorneys general and special assistant U.S. attorneys, allowing them to pursue cases in state and federal court. State investigators will also work directly with the FBI, giving them the same authority to pursue cases in both court systems.
U.S. Attorney Scott Leary said the arrangement allows officials to move more efficiently between jurisdictions.
“We’re working together to marshal these resources,” Leary said. “Now we’ve got a state investigator that is a TFO with the FBI that can investigate state and federal crimes. That’s how we work together.”
The prosecutors will focus primarily on fraud but will also handle cases involving crimes by criminal aliens, human trafficking and drug trafficking, officials said. Investigators from four existing task forces, the Human Trafficking Task Force, the Fentanyl Strike Force, Internet Crimes Against Children and the Cyber Fraud Task Force, will feed cases into the new unit.
“When someone steals from Medicare, Medicaid, SNAP, disaster assistance, small business programs, they’re stealing the money twice,” U.S. Attorney Baxter Kruger said. “They’re taking it from the taxpayer, and they’re taking it from the people that it’s meant to go to.”
Officials pointed to the scale of the problem nationally and in Mississippi. FBI Special Agent in Charge Robert Eikhoff said Mississippians filed more than 5,000 complaints last year alone, reporting more than $77 million in losses tied to internet-based fraud. He said the schemes range from benefits skimming to romance scams to fake government phone calls, and increasingly, artificial intelligence is making them harder to detect.
“The most recent numbers I’ve seen is nearly a billion dollars tied to AI-influenced or facilitated schemes across the country,” Eikhoff said. “And it’s only going to grow. So I cannot emphasize enough: trust but verify when someone is asking you to give them money.”
Officials said speed is critical once a scam is reported. Eikhoff said the earlier a victim notifies law enforcement, the better the odds of recovering stolen funds.
“You have to notify law enforcement immediately,” Eikhoff said. “The clock starts ticking, and as that clock moves, it becomes more and more challenging for us to recover those funds.”
The Mississippi Attorney General’s Office said it has already recovered more than $105 million for Mississippi taxpayers in recent years, including money taken from programs such as SNAP, Medicaid and small business relief funds. Leary said fraud involving Paycheck Protection Program loans was especially severe in north Mississippi, where more than half of roughly $1 billion in COVID-era loans was found to be fraudulent.
Officials encouraged anyone who believes they have been targeted by a scam to report it immediately. Complaints can be filed online at IC3.gov or by calling 1-800-CALL-FBI.
News article: https://www.wlbt.com/2026/10/06/new-task-force-brings-federal-state-resources-together-fight-fraud-mississippi/