An Indian national who defrauded senior citizens in the US was given a 33-month jail term and had to pay USD 2.4 million in fines.
On August 4 of last year, Ashish Bajaj, 29, entered a plea of guilty to the complaint charging him with conspiracy to conduct wire fraud before District Judge Kevin McNulty in Newark federal court.
The Department of Justice said on Thursday that he was sentenced to 33 months in prison, two years of supervised release, and forced to pay USD 2.4 million in restitution for his involvement in a global conspiracy that preyed on elderly victims in New Jersey and around the US.
According to papers, Bajaj and his cohorts preyed on senior victims across the US between April 2020 and August 2021 by posing as fraud protection experts for different banks, online shops, and online payment businesses.
Falsely claiming to be fraud protection experts employed by respected businesses, they phoned victims and informed them that their bank accounts, online shopping carts, or online payment accounts were being targeted for fraud.
Prosecutors claim that Bajaj and his accomplices then misled the victims into believing that they were needed as part of a sting operation to apprehend the fraudsters.
They fraudulently promised to repay the elderly victims’ money within a few days following the alleged sting operation and urged them to transfer funds from their bank accounts to accounts they controlled.
The victims were also misled into believing that the sting operation would result in the arrest of the alleged offenders after they submitted the money. Several banks in India, China, Singapore, and the United Arab Emirates received international wire transactions from them, according to court records.
Also, the victims sent funds to Bajaj’s American bank accounts via an internet program.
Also, they sent money orders and cashier’s cheques to Bajaj at a Californian location. The records state that the plan caused losses of more than USD 250,000.
