Ashburn Man Pleads Guilty to Global ID Theft, Money Laundering Schemes

ASHBURN, VA – An Ashburn man, Amit Chaudhry, 44, faces up to 20 years in prison for complex international identity theft and money laundering conspiracy schemes, according to an announcement by the U.S. Department of Justice. Hundreds of people were victimized by an international identity scheme, including a Hollywood actress, whose identification in a photo on a fake passport aided the investigation into the scheme by authorities, the Washington Post reported.

Chaudhry pleaded guilty on Tuesday, Sept. 20, to two counts of conspiracy to commit money laundering, one count of aggravated identity theft, and one count of conspiracy to commit visa fraud for his role and participation in a sophisticated and large-scale identity theft and credit card fraud conspiracy, according to the DOJ announcement.

According to the court documents, Chaudhry is an Indian national who became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 2005. Beginning in 2011, the defendant was part of a large, international wire fraud and money laundering conspiracy that involved processing stolen credit card numbers and laundering the proceeds through hundreds of bank accounts. Some of these bank accounts were set up in the name of shell companies, which did no real business, prosecutors said.

The fraud and money laundering conspiracy was carried out in part by teams of individuals working together in India, the U.S., Europe and other parts of the world. Some members would obtain the personal identifying information of real people; other members would obtain the credit card information from actual credit card customers, such as American Express customers, and yet others would be responsible for electronically processing the stolen credit card transactions.

Chaudhry helped launder the proceeds of the credit card fraud and assist co-conspirators who would come to the U.S. from India to open bank accounts used to hold and receive fraud proceeds, according to the DOJ.

According to the Washington Post, the complex illegal enterprise involved stolen identities, including that of “Smallville” and “Supergirl” actress Laura Vandervoort. An FBI agent recognized Vandervoort's photo on a fraudulent passport, authorities said, which was taken of a scene in a television show. The image identification helped authorities in their investigation, the Washington Post reported.

According to the DOJ, Chaudhry also helped conceal and launder proceeds from a fraud scheme that targeted customers seeking cheap travel, including airline tickets and hotel reservations. Chaudhry helped to promote the fraudulent travel websites, including through mass mailings to prospective customers. Other members of the conspiracy would hold themselves out as prospective travel agents to customers. Customers’ travel itineraries would be purchased with stolen credit cards, which often resulted in those reservations being canceled. The customer’s money would be held and transferred among bank accounts controlled by members of the conspiracy, including Chaudhry, according to the DOJ.

More than 1,000 people were victimized from this fraud, which used various sophisticated means to conceal the identities of the conspirators, prosecutors said. The amount of the fraudulent proceeds generated by the money laundering conspiracy was more than $25 million.

According to the DOJ, Chaudhry was also involved in a separate money laundering conspiracy with Jacqueline Green-Morris, of Woodbridge, Virginia, who previously pleaded guilty to money laundering conspiracy.

According to court documents, Chaudhry and Green-Morris came up with a fraudulent billing scheme, whereby Chaudhry would submit inflated and fraudulent invoices for IT training to ActioNet, a contractor based in Virginia. Green-Morris used her position as an ActioNet employee to pay these fraudulent invoices.

Chaudhry and Green-Morris split the fraud proceeds, prosecutors said, which totaled approximately $4.1 million between 2012 and June 2016.

From at least 2001 through at least June 2016, according to the announcement, Chaudhry and others conspired to commit visa fraud by submitting false and fraudulent H-1B visa applications through various entities that Chaudhry and others owned and controlled, including Networkxchange, Technologyxchange, Secure Networks and the Knowledge Center. The conspiracy involved the submission of false and fraudulent applications and supporting documentation to the U.S. Department of Labor and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.

Some of the fraudulent documents submitted to the U.S. government were signed using the name John King, a journalist who is CNN’s chief national correspondent, according to the DOJ announcement.

Image via Shutterstock