A Utah man has been caught red-handed defrauding an organic produce giant out of a whopping $5.8 million by peddling bogus invoices from a shell company, justice department officials said today.
Kevin Scott Horton, 56, of Saratoga Springs, Utah, was convicted on seven counts of mail fraud for a scheme that duped Melissa's World Variety Produce Inc., based in Vernon, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office, Central District of California. His partner in crime, Tony Anhtuan Rawlings, formerly the IT director at Melissa’s, facilitated the fraud from the inside, by approving the phony payments.
The con, which ran from 2000 to 2018, involved Horton and Rawlings creating fictitious invoices under the facade of Creative Network Solutions, a shell entity established solely to milk Melissa's cash. The invoices claimed payments for non-existent IT services, duping company executives into cutting checks for thin air.
The FBI uncovered the multi-million-dollar scheme that led to Horton's conviction and his subsequent date with Destiny—a sentencing hearing set for August 5 where he faces up to two decades in the slammer per count of mail fraud. Rawlings is also awaiting his judgment day, scheduled for June 20, as reported by the U.S. Attorney's Office, Central District of California.
Assistant United States Attorneys Eli A. Alcaraz, Kelsey A. Stimson, and Haoxiaohan H. Cai led the prosecution of the case, while Public Information Officer Ciaran McEvoy disclosed the details in a news release.
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