Crooks ply their trade even when America is faced with a deadly disease.

The Oklahoma Employment Securities Commission has reported almost 4,000 fraudulent claims since the coronavirus outbreak in mid-March.

Scam artists are filing unemployment claims to try to trick state officials into sending them cash cards. They file claims for workers who still have jobs and even worse, they file claims that state they were laid off from companies where they never worked.

Some Tulsa small businesses with only one, two or three employees are getting letters from the OESC notifying them that someone has filed a claim against them. These people never worked for these small companies.

More than 50,000 Oklahomans have filed for unemployment. These scammers are taking advantage of the huge volume of claims and the urgent needs of legitimate workers to file false claims and steal money from not only the government but from these small businesses.

Workers named in these letters and these businesses can suffer financially from these phony claims. This is not a “victimless” crime.

Because of the coronavirus, law enforcement has been extremely busy and the thieves take advantage of that, too.

Oklahoma Attorney General Mike Hunter and his office are anxious to find these scammers and put them behind bars.

Stealing is always bad. Stealing during a pandemic is particularly low and should carry the maximum punishment allowed by law.