UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

┐ UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, │ Plaintiff-Appellee, │ > No. 24-5857 │ v. │ │ IRENE MICHELLE FIKE, │ Defendant-Appellant. │ ┘

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky at Lexington. No. 5:24-cr-00001-1—Gregory F. Van Tatenhove, District Judge.

Decided and Filed: June 10, 2025

Before: GILMAN, DAVIS, and MATHIS, Circuit Judges. _________________

COUNSEL ON BRIEF: Rachel D. Yavelak, Russell Baldani, BALDANI LAW GROUP, Lexington, Kentucky, for Appellant. John M. Spires, Charles P. Wisdom, Jr., UNITED STATES ATTORNEY’S OFFICE, Lexington, Kentucky, for Appellee. _________________

OPINION _________________

DAVIS, Circuit Judge. Irene Michelle Fike appeals from the district court’s restitution award to the victim that Fike defrauded. She asks that we vacate the district court’s inclusion of prejudgment interest in that award. Fike argues that the Mandatory Victims Restitution Act of 1996, 18 U.S.C. § 3663A, does not permit courts to add interest as part of an award compensating a victim’s losses, and what’s more, the district court did not have a sufficient basis No. 24-5857 United States v. Fike Page 2

for calculating the interest awarded here. Because the district court did not abuse its discretion, we affirm.

I.

From 2016 to 2021, Fike worked at an accounting firm, where she performed bookkeeping tasks for one of the firm’s clients, J.M. and J.M.’s family. When Fike left the firm in 2021, J.M. hired her as an independent contractor, entrusting her to pay bills, update financial records, and complete other bookkeeping tasks. Fike exploited her position, first at the accounting firm and then as an independent contractor, to defraud J.M. Fike used her access to J.M.’s financial accounts at Morgan Stanley and WinFirst Financial to pay Fike’s personal credit card bills. She also used J.M.’s financial information and means of identification to buy items from online retailers, such as, Kohls and Amazon. To conceal her fraud and avoid arousing the family’s suspicions, Fike misrepresented J.M.’s expenditures and debits in financial reports. Fike continued her fraudulent conduct even after she stopped working for J.M. around February 2022. Between April 2018 and September 2022, Fike defrauded J.M. of $363,657.67.

In 2024, Fike pleaded guilty to a two-count information charging her with wire fraud, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1343, and aggravated identity theft, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1028A. The district court subsequently sentenced Fike to thirty-six months’ imprisonment, followed by three years of supervised release. It also ordered her to pay J.M. $405,867.08 in restitution under the Mandatory Victims Restitution Act of 1996 (“MVRA”), 18 U.S.C. § 3663A. This sum included the principal amount of $363,657.67, plus $42,209.41 in prejudgment interest, which the district court considered necessary to make J.M. whole. The district court waived post- judgment in