A Miami resident was sentenced to 40 months in prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release for his role in defrauding victims in an Internal Revenue Service (IRS) impersonator scam.

Benjamin G. Greenberg, Acting United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, Timothy Camus, Deputy Inspector General for Investigations, Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA), Mark Selby, Special Agent in Charge, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations (ICE-HSI), and Kelly R. Jackson, Special Agent in Charge, Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI), made the announcement.

Anandkumar Jayantila Nayee, previously pled guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 1349, and one count of aggravated identity theft, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 1028A(a)(1).

According to court documents, from January 2014 through early 2017, defendant Nayee conspired with others to defraud victims. Nayee’s co-conspirators contacted victims by telephone and made fraudulent representations to them, including that the victims owed income tax payments to the IRS, or owed fees for grants or loans that they had purportedly received. Nayee’s co-conspirators instructed the victims to deposit payments related to the taxes or fees that they purportedly owed onto debit cards and into bank accounts controlled by Nayee and his co-conspirators. Nayee and his co-conspirators then received and retained the victims’ payments.

From January 2014 through February 28, 2014, a co-conspirator purchased Green Dot prepaid debit cards and provided the full debit card numbers to Nayee, who resided in India at the time. Nayee then caused the prepaid debit cards to be registered in the names of real people, and notified his co-conspirator once the cards had been funded by victims of the telephone fraud scheme. The co-conspirator then used the prepaid debit cards to purchase money orders, and deposited the money orders into bank accounts specified by Nayee.

Nayee moved to the Southern District of Florida from India in 2015. He and his co-conspirators picked up funds that that had been sent via money transfer by victims of the telephone fraud scheme, and deposited those funds into accounts controlled by Nayee and his co-conspirators. Nayee was held responsible for at least $150,000 in victim losses during the telephone fraud scheme.

Mr. Greenberg commended the investigative efforts of TIGTA, ICE-HSI, and IRS-CI. This case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Daya Nathan.

Related court documents and information may be found on the website of the District Court for the Southern District of Florida at www.flsd.uscourts.gov or on http://pacer.flsd.uscourts.gov.