As a federal grand jury indictment reveals, four individuals face charges for a sophisticated fraud targeting a San Francisco-based delivery company. The scheme, executed between November 2020 and February 2021, involved creating fictitious customer and driver accounts, leading to the company, dubbed "Entity One", losing over $2.5 million to payments for deliveries that never occurred, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office. The accused, Sayee Chaitanya Reddy Devagiri, Manaswi Mandadapu, Matheus Duarte, and Hari Vamsi Anne, were apprehended last Friday after an investigation by the FBI.
According to the indictment filed on Aug. 7 and unsealed on the day of the arrests, the accused used insider access to manipulate the delivery platform. Released on bond after their initial court appearances were Devagiri and Mandadapu in Southern California, whereas Anne remains detained in Texas pending further legal proceedings. As alleged in the indictment, "Individual One," as per the U.S. Attorney’s Office, an ex-employee of Entity One, identified as Tyler Thomas Bottenhorn, had conferred the crucial system access to the defendants. Charged separately in a related case, Bottenhorn pleaded guilty in 2023 to involvement in the fraudulent scheme.
Each defendant now faces up to 20 years in prison and a fine of $250,000 if found guilty, with potential additional restitution payments. An indictment is not a conviction but a formal accusation of wrongdoing. "All defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt," states the gravity of the offense outlined by U.S. Attorney's Office Ismail J. Ramsey and FBI Special Agent in Charge Robert K. Tripp when they announced the indictment., as cited by the U.S. Department of Justice.
The Assistant U.S. Attorneys at the helm of the prosecution, Michael G. Pitman and Jeffrey D. Nedrow, are working with Sahib Kaur's assistance to bring this complex case to a just resolution. The FBI conducted the investigation, which led to the indictment and subsequent arrests, highlighting the severity of federal law enforcement pursuing cyber-related fraud.
